Tron 2.14 – Encapsulation

Jet sat in the van for a moment longer, realized that he probably wouldn’t think of anything to say to his father, then got out and stood by the door.

All of the others were going through their well-rehearsed process at the back of the ambulance and Jet thought he would be in the way if he started trying to help at the moment.

There was a brief clatter as Alan, Flynn and Steve worked together to remove a medical bed from the rear of the vehicle, its legs dropping to the floor as it slid back.

Alison stood back with her hands held together at her chest and watched while Brian held her from behind.

Once the bed was out and everyone moved away from the vehicle, Jet walked to the back of the van and stood in the gap between the two cars.

It was the first time he saw Melanie.

The bed had a number of frames attached, each holding different medical monitors. Melanie’s actual face was covered with a transit hood, intended, Jet thought, to stop things falling on her face as she was moved about.

She moaned softly as they moved her, her arms moving feebly, but it was clear from the sluggishness of the moving that it was causing her pain and even then she didn’t move a lot.

As soon as Melanie was clear of the ambulance, Alison, moved to the bedside and Brian grabbed a large trolley that was sitting off to the side and pushed it to the back of the van that had brought Jet and the others.

“Jet, can you load the trolley as I pass things down to you,” he called out as he moved.

Jet looked at him and started to move, initially forgetting his curiosity about Alison’s ill sister. Brian locked the trolley wheels when it was in place behind the van and Jet climbed onto it. Brian then jumped into the van and started handing things out to Jet who loaded them onto the trolley.

This gave Jet a better chance to look at the equipment they had brought along. Much of it was older mainframe access equipment such as early terminals for the five-eleven. Jet had thought that terminals were quite common around Encom and he wondered why they were bringing their own.

Brian spoke as he unloaded the vehicle.

“Stay close to us, Jet. The security in this building is still active even if most of the original security was removed.” He said.

“Removed?” queried Jet.

“The last of the staff moved out a week ago and the terminals and equipment they used was moved out over the last week,” Brian explained. Jet now realized why they had brought this equipment in with them.

“So why any security at all if everything is gone?” asked Jet.

“We’re actually lucky it’s down to this level,” said Brian. “The Five-eleven nodes are still running so I think they wanted to keep all of their security here but there was some kind of incident at the new location after they moved the staff. Now it’s just rentacops like me and even then not many on the nightshift.”

“Can’t beat dumb luck then,” said Jet, putting down a large terminal monitor with a CRT. “So what is the security here?”

Brian pointed up to the roof.

“Three guards patrolling floors, one at the watchpoint and one in the lobby.” He said.

Flynn nodded. “Aren’t they going to interrupt us?” he asked.

Brian shook his head and got a grin that spread most of the way across the front of his face. “Most of the floors are empty, but there’s still fixtures. They intend to rip it all down, but there’s still executive levels. Nice stuff. I kind said I might be borrowing some of it with some friends and asked them not to patrol the basement floors. They’ve assigned the floors we’re working to me and don’t want to know what’s going on. They expect two vehicles. Cost me a few cartons of beer.”

Jet considered it for a moment. “Have you ever considered getting work as a hacker?” he asked.

Brian shook his head but the big smile went somewhat. “No, I can’t do stuff with computers. But I want to. Alison said she’d teach me after this.”

“You seem to have the basics of social engineering down just fine,” said Jet.

Brian didn’t quite understand what Jet meant. Jet told him not to worry and to finish loading the trolley.

As soon as it was all loaded, they headed off towards the lifts at the centre of the underground carpark and Brian slotted his security card through the access panel. The lights indicated the lift was called so they waited.

As the elevator door opened with a quiet ping, Both Jet and Brian were surprised as a security guard dressed in the same uniform as Brian stepped out of the elevator and stopped directly in front of them.

He had a large mirror in his hands, which extended from the floor to just over his head. Over one shoulder, he had a small mesh sack, protruding from which was a set of expensive tap fittings, with fresh masonry dust still around the piping it was all attached to.

“Brian,” said the guard. Brian stood mouth agape as the security guard ahead of them took a look at all of the equipment on the trolley.

“That’s ancient stuff. It’s not going to fetch much” the other guard said. “Trolley is a good idea.”

Jet stood still, not sure what to say. Brian wasn’t far behind. Before they could say anything, the security guard stepped back into the lift.

“My bad,” he said, as the doors closed. “Meant to get out at 34.” And the elevator disappeared.

Jet looked at Brian and Brian looked back at Jet. Neither seemed to know what to say at first.

“Friend of yours,” asked Jet.

“One of the other guards,” said Brian. “Guess he has the same idea, but didn’t tell me about it.”

Jet thought about it for a while. “Damn lucky their decommissioning this place or he might have wondered why we’re bringing a trolley loaded with stuff to the elevator. Thank god for pilfering.”

Brian nodded. When the elevator came back down, it was empty, but there was a chilled beer in one corner with a smiley face drawn on it.

As they loaded the trolley into the elevator, Brian picked it up and looked. “It’s one of mine” he said, grimacing. “I guess he didn’t really want us to know he was up to the same.”

The elevator moved down to the sub-basement where the laser storage containment system was located. This was the heart of Encom and represented its entire research legacy that had been cut short following the failed F-Con takeover and subsequent shutdown.

The elevator stopped and a crack of bright light appeared through the door as it began to open. As the doors continued to slide a very bright beam stabbed its way into the elevators and Jet unexpectedly needed to cover his eyes with his forearm to shield them from the glare.

As his eyes adjusted, Jet stared into the harsh glow of the work lamp positioned before the elevator door. Beyond was darkness punctuated by the glow of the other work lamps posted around the facility.

The very edge of the scaffolding reflected the light and beyond this, darkness permeated everything giving this place a chilling atmosphere. The size of the place seemed to amplify the effect, making the huge room truly cavernous.

Brian pushed the trolley quickly into the darkness beyond the lamp and a keyboard fell off as he went. He glanced behind only briefly and Jet knelt slightly to pick it up so Brian could continue without waiting.

Tucking the keyboard under his arm, Jet felt that he had walked into an alien carnation of the place he had spent so much time in while visiting his parents.

He hadn’t been here since his mother had died.

The main lights were all off and small light-sticks were located at each junction Brian needed to follow, although Jet still knew the way so well, he thought he could have moved through the scaffolding in complete darkness.

Each time they moved past a workstation however, Jet was surprised by the bare workspace, the equipment that had occupied each location never having been moved or even upgraded before. Now it was just simply gone.

As jet made his way through the darkness, he followed the sounds of the trolley, which stopped making noise just a moment before Jet moved into the central console section of the digitizing peripheral of the EN511.

Everyone was working as if to some pre-arranged pattern, all nearty keeping out of each-others way in the small space with choreographed precision. To one side, directly on the digitizing pad before the laser, Doctor Gurimin was setting up some medical equipment on the bed for his daughter. The bed had been turned side on and tilted so the beam could access the girl without obstruction.

The console was missing and the desk it usually sat on bare. Some of the work lights in this area appeared hastily rigged and all of the computer equipment, save for the console interfaces, was already gone.

Brian and Alison went immediately to work unstacking the contents of the trolley onto the console desk and setting up the main console.

Jet’s father and Flynn were talking over on the other side of the clearing, discussing something. During the conversation, Alan looked up and Flynn placed a hand on the man’s shoulder before he patted it, smiled at Flynn and then walked over to speak to Jet.

“Escuse me Jet,”Alison said as she walked around the trolley. “I need to get my own console out”

Jet stepped back as Alison reached down and pulled a laptop out of the pile, spilling a bundle of cables off the top as she did. A hand-painted hacker motif looking like a digital Yin/Yang decorated the top panel.

It was embossed with alchemic chemical symbols around the outside and the impurities in the Yin and Yang were comprised in one case of a circle with the letter L in it and the other was a circle with 8 radial spokes pointing inwards at all of the compass settings a short distance from the ring. Very geekish, Jet thought. Alison move off with the laptop as Alan reached Jet.

“They can do without us for a moment, Son, Can we talk?” Alan asked.

“Sure dad”, said Jet, and moved back into the darkness to the previous worklight, out of sight and immediate earshot of the others.

Jet turned and faced his father who was looking him in the eyes, raising and lowering his arms a little, as if not sure what to do.

“I really missed you Jet,” Alan said.

Jet nodded, then stepped forward suprising his father with a solid hug, which at first Alan was too surprised to return, but then returned in equal.

“I missed you too dad,” he said. “I’m really sorry about how things happened.”

His dad, nodded as tears started to form in his eyes.

“I’m sorry too Jet. I was too involved in what I was doing. I should have left Encom after the accident and made the most of my time with you.” He said.

Jet shook his head and slowly released his hug, waiting for his father to do the same and stepping back.

“I’m proud of you Helping out here,” Alan said. “Flynn said he tried to dissuade you from coming.”

Jet nodded. “You know I came here for my own reasons.”

Jet expected his father to be surprised. Alan gave no indication of it.

“Yes, you always did want to come back here, but the place was shut down too soon after we retrieved the F-Con trio.”

Jet nodded. He knew is father didn’t believe in the digital world. He was just worried about the dangers associated with digitization. “It’s real dad, I know it is. I’m sorry you don’t agree with that.”

Alan’s eyes grew sad and understanding. “If it’s real for you then it’s real enough,” he said. “But I’ve spoken with Flynn and I think you even have him convinced again there is something on the other side once more. I’m not sure what you told him, but he’s certain we should trust you.”

“I’ve got a promise to keep, Dad. Please help me with that.” Jet said to his father, attempting to keep his voice from shaking. “It’s just what I have to do and after I’ve done that, We can sort things out.”

Alan nodded. “I’d like that son,” he said. “I’d really like that.”

This time Alan reached in and hugged Jet fiercely as if it was the last time he. When Alan finally released the hug he started talking again.

“There’s not much time. Flynn told me what you need to do and that’s OK, but we need your help. We need you forge permission for Alison’s application to allow direct access to the fiber loop memory on the five-eleven.

“Once that’s done, we can operate on Melanie Gurimin. After we get Melanie back out of the system and re-integrated, we’ll need a half-hour to stabilize her.

“In that time, you can access the five-eleven from the console or if you’re really determined, you can even digitize yourself. I’ll stand by on the correction algorithms.”

Jet smiled. His father was terrified of the laser ever since it took his mother away.

“Thanks Dad,” Jet said. “I need your help too.”

Alan gripped his son’s shoulder and squeezed. “I’m glad I’ve finally been able to watch you grow into a man Jet.” Then looked over his shoulder as if he could see all the way back to the central console area.

“I need to complete the setup” Alan said.

Jet smiled. “We’ll have time to discuss this later, Dad. Let’s keep our minds where we need them to be at the moment.”.

“Sure, let’s.” said Alan and released his son’s shoulder and walked back to the digitizing clearing. Jet followed just a step or two behind.

The team had done an incredible amount of work in the time available. The console deck was fully installed and blinking with a cursor in the brief time Jet had spoken with his father.

Alison was hard at work and Flynn was off to the side installing the hard drive pack into one of the old arrays. Dr Gurimin was checking the settings on the equipment attached to his daughters bed and slowly disconnecting tubes and needles.

Jet got his first look at Melanie. At first he was shocked at how gaunt she appeared, hollow cheeks and thin limbs, yet her eyes still sparkled with a suprising intensity. There was something else in there he could feel when he looked into those eyes, but the explanation eluded him. For a moment she looked across at him and smiled weakly like she knew him.

She lifted one thin hand in his general direction and looked at her father, trying to say something. The doctor held her hand gently and put it back down, looked at Jet briefly and the said something to her that Jet didn’t catch.

Melanie returned her gaze to Jet and smiled, her eyes like black pools in the darkness, reflecting glints of light from the work lamps.

For some reason the look put Jet at ease and he realized he too wanted to help this girl. Something about the way she held herself when she was about to undergo a process that was not only theoretical and experimental, but quite dangerous.

The doctor effortlessly lifted the near side of the bed then, tilting Melanie and obscuring Jet’s view of her, yet he had the feeling she was still looking in her direction. Then he realized she wouldn’t be looking in the other direction at the laser as the initial flash of exposure would blind her before the digitizing process started.

“Jet,” called Flynn, twisting the chair located near the console towards him. “Time to show us how it’s done.”

Jet walked over to the table and sat down. Alison smiled briefly at him but her fingers were already a blur on her own keyboard and he started to realized just how rare such talent was. For a moment, he almost felt as if he were in competition with her.

The EN511 was still processing the terminal access request and was still a while from providing Jet with the login screen. He looked over at Alison’s screen. It was an old-system 12-82 emulation and mostly text-based display suspended within a graphical user interface window.

The emulation was quicker than the terminal on the initial handshake and Jet watched as she connected ahead of him to the system. Text for the login came up and Alison responded to input line on the terminal with EN511 format responses. Little had changed in this system from its original conception except for the addition of a full ASCII set to the display. All 96 characters.

## Mounting application space. Partition installed. User space online.

## Welcome to the Encom Laser Storage System. Please enter your identity.

“Let’s hope that they never removed the legacy accounts from the system or this is going to get really hard.” Alison said to Jet. “My account was only a week old when they canned us.”

>> User account: Plumbum

>> User Password Hash: ########

>> I have priority access 7

Alison bit her finger for a moment.

## Welcome Alison Gurimin. What do you want to do?

Alison smiled.

>> Release Application: Alchemy

>> Mount point: JA 0-313-33304-1

The cursor blinked several times after Alison hit enter.

“No, No, No,” said Alison, shaking her head at the delay. “No No. Don’t tell me it’s not going to work.”

Finally the cursor returned.

## Program Alchemy loaded. Pending execution. Waiting on prioritization.

“Yes,” exclaimed Alison, making a fist and pulling it down and back in a show of triumph. She looked at Jet.

“You sound like a bit,” Jet said.

“A bit?,” she asked quizzically.

“Yes and No,” Jet started to explain. “Don’t worry about it. What do I need to do.”

Alison smiled. “I’ve loaded the application that will perform the surgery into the system and started it running. It’s clearing the buffer for reception and now you need to up-level its permissions and give it authorization to access the memory loop data stream directly.”

Jet was able to see the pressure Alison was under as she completed the initial work. Behind him he made out the almost inaudible sound of the hard drive pack mounting.

Alison’s screen came to life as the GUI interface fully took over from the text terminal. This would interpret the data coming from the system and display it in a graphical format rather than the text only format that Alison used to access the operating system initially.

The screen opened up a mesh 3-D composite of Melanie, waiting for the system to commence digitization.

Jet’s own terminal had started up now and the familiar cursor appeared.

## Mounting application space. Partition installed. User space online.

## Welcome to the Encom Laser Storage System. Please enter your identity.

Jet cracked his fingers, by interweaving them and forcing them out, then started to type.

>> User account: Jet

>> User Password Hash: ##############

>> I have priority access 5

Alison looked over. “Priority access five?” she asked. “Is that normal for a researcher?”

Jet smiled as his father looked over his shoulder. “Access five. That’s not normal for a space paranoids developer” he said.

Jet smiled. “I modified the system to accept different passphrases for different access levels,” Jet said. “I guess I kind of hacked the network after you told me not to.”

“You hacked the Encom system while you worked here in the game division?” Flynn asked incredulously, walking up behind them all. “You’re better than I thought”.

“Son,” started Alan, “I thought you promised me you wouldn’t do anything stupid like that again.”

“Dad,” Jet protested. “It was two years ago and I did this before long you made me promise. And I never used the higher level account at work”

Alan shook his head. “You were right Flynn. We do need him.”

Jet returned to his work.

## Welcome Jethro Bradley. How may I serve you?

Flynn read off the screen “How may I serve you?” as Jet continued to type. Jet had made some serious changes to his personal login Flynn realized.

>> Request:
>> Change Permissions 6,8 True – Memory Space: JA 0-313-33304-1

## Current bits set: 1-2-5

## Request acknowledged. Enter authorization phrase.

Jet paused and breathed in through his nose.

>> Authorisation Phrase: Reindeer Flotilla

“You just typed WHAT!” exclaimed Flynn.

“Some idiot left a back door in the system from way back. I found it when I trawled the system logs for authorization strings in the old kernel dumps from the historical archive,” said Jet. “Same thing gave me access to priority levels 4 through 6.”

Alan looked over at his old friend. “You never cleaned up, did you Flynn?” he said quietly.

“Yeah, yeah. Trust your kid to find that one,” mumbled Flynn. “If I knew Gibbs junior had missed that, I could have done this myself.”

## Authorisation Revoked.

## Please See Gibbs for Access.

## End of Line.

“Hmm” said Flynn. “Guess Gibbsey wasn’t as dull witted as we thought he was.”

Alan pointed to the screen. “Any ideas Jet?”

Jet shook his head, then remembered something. “Flynn, what year did they update the access system?”

Flynn thought for a moment. “1994.” He said.

“And the authorization schedule?” Jet enquired.

“1992”. Flynn said. Alan looked at him surprised.

“You weren’t even here then,” Alan said.

“I did keep track of how things were going after I left,” he said.

Jet started typing again.

>> Request:
>> Change Permissions &H8180 Logical OR – Memory Space: JA 0-313-33304-1

The cursor blinked.

## Converting format. Bit mask alignment process.

## Memory space JA 0-313-33304-1 permission set changed. Resetting 2’s complement flag.

## Bit set, 1-2-5-6-8

## Application access granted. Stream access granted.

## End of Line.

Jet smiled. “Forgot to mask for negative numbers in integer form right?”

Alan shook his head. Flynn just smiled. “That was quick.”

Jet also seemed satisfied with his work. “Yes it was,” he added.

Alison had already started typing again now her access had been upgraded.

“We’re online and the surgical app is ready to go. I’m showing all status interrupts available. We’re operational.” She said.

Jet got up and passed the console to his father. Alan was far more familiar with the laser operation, so Jet stepped around the back of the table.

As Alan typed, various old systems came online and lights started to glow, blink or otherwise acknowledge their reactivation after a year in hibernation. The lab network seemed to be coming to life again.

Now that he was standing at the back of the table, Jet saw the symbol on the back of the laptop more clearly. The username Alison had used, Plumbum, was inscribed in very light letters near the L with a circle around it.

The other symbol in the centre section was a little stranger. It too had words – Hydrargyrum – inscribed next to it.

Something started to tug at Jet’s thoughts when he read this. Brian came up to him and interrupted his chain of thought by handing him a pair of goggles. “For the laser” he said.

Alan finished typing and a familiar voice came over a makeshift audio module attached to the network and fixed to the side of the terminal.

“Ma3a operational and active. Welcome back Alan1” the voice came over. “Awaiting voice commands”

Ma3a did sound a little like his mother, Jet had to admit, but while some others at Encom had found it creepy, he had always felt safe with the voice of the application his mother wrote before her demise. It wasn’t quite her and Jet knew it wasn’t meant to be, but it had the same soft tone. It still reminded him of her.

“Ma3a” Alan addressed the open space as he talked. “Activate Program Alchemist. Prepare buffer space.”

Ma3a responded.

“Allocating buffer space.

“Buffer allocation status: Laser storage system buffer available.

“Loading Alchemist to control buffer.

“Alchemist loaded.

“Permissions check – Alchemist has control authorization.

“Alan1. Do you want to use Alchemist to control digitization sequence?”

Alan nodded although Ma3a was only a voice application and wouldn’t have noticed the nod. “Confirm. Use Alchemist for Encapsulation Protocol.”

“Alchemist confirmed. Laser safety system on. Laser Offline.” Ma3a called.

“Ma3a, bring laser online. Authorisation: Alan Bradley. Initiate Power Sequence.” Alan called out.

Somewhere deep in the facility, the sound of the power cells charging the laser system began as a soft high-frequency whine.

“Power systems engaging.

“Oculus focus mode initiated.

“Collimation system Online and aligned.

A light green glow spread throughout the frame, giving the darkness depth around them.

“Laser system powering up. Please standby for calibration.”

“20

“19”

Ma3a continued counting down. Her voice was softer in the background now compared to the noise of the laser system coming online.

Jet thought about the graphic logo on the back of Alison’s laptop as Ma3a counted down. Alison was still working furiously and only Dr Gulimin was standing still, next to his daughter and holding her hand as the laser began its calibration sequence.

“I’m not frightened daddy,” she said. “I know you’ll take care of me.”

“I love you Melanie,” he said back almost inaudibly.

“2… 1 Initialisation completed.” Ma3a continued.

“Laser systems online

“storage system active.”

“Correction Algorythm Online and Operational. All systems confirmed operational.”

Alan walked over to Steve Guliman and put a hand on his shoulder. “It’s time Steve,” he said quietly.

The doctor leaned over and kissed his daughter on the head and wiped the hair from her face gently. “Fifteen minutes the program should take and then the cancer will be gone.” He said. Tears were falling from his face now as he spoke.

“I know I’ll be alright. Leadhead’s programmed this right?” she whispered.

Jet caught the word. Things started firing in his mind. Something he needed to know was clawing at the inside of his mind, trying to make it into his consciousness.

The doctor put his daughter’s hand back down no and gently removed the sheet on the bed, exposing his daughter’s body to the laser digitizing head.

Alison, Alan and the others all put their goggles on. Jet did the same.

“Ma3a, align target and complete prepatory scan,” Alan called out.

“Commencing scan” Ma3a came back.

A green laser shot out of the laser scanning head and flicked across the girl’s body. It began to measure the buffer space needed and prepared for scanning. Melanie closed her eyes as the process began.

Jet looked at the Yin and Yang symbol again. Leadhead she had said. Lead. Plumbum.

The intuition clicked. Alison was Lead. The Yin and Yang symbol represented the two girls. The symbol represented the Alchemic version of Yin and Yang.

“Pre-Scan completed. Buffer adequate. Application Alchemist confirmed.” Ma3a came back.

Alison completed her work and looked to her sister. Jet reached down to the trolley and removed the safety goggles, then handed several sets around. Each person put them on.

Alan started to speak again now, addressing everyone.

“We’re ready to go people. Here goes something.”

It had become Alan’s standard pre-firing brief. He had taken from something his wife used to say and subsequently had adopted it as his own.

Alan looked at the doctor questioningly, then to Alison and back to the doctor. They were in agreement to proceed.

Steve Gulimin nodded to Alan to confirm it, his cheeks slick with tears, reflecting the green glow of the laser.

Jet moved to the back of the table again and looked at the graphic again. The work Hydrargyrum stood out now.

“Latin,” Jet mumbled to himself, looking at the word.

“Commence digitization sequence,” called out Alan.

“Hydrar Gyrum. Hg” Jet’s mind ached as it searched for the connection.

“Commencing Digitization Sequence” responded Ma3a. The laser hummed as it reached operating power.

“Hg – Alchemy,” said Jet as he finally made the connection. It was Mercury. Alison was Lead. Melanie was Mercury.

Jet suddenly realized that Melanie was the Mercury. Melanie was Mercury’s user. She had supplied the algorythm’s to Jet’s father when they started programming through a guest account on the system.

Jet suddenly had a flash of insight into why only he and Flynn had successfully digitized all the way to the world on the other side of the screen. Jet had no counterpart program in the digital world. Flynn’s counterpart was destroyed, Flynn had explained, when the MCP derezzed it.

Melanie was going in with her counterpart somewhere still in the system. He wondered if he should check with Flynn and his father to see if they thought it might cause a quantum stability issue with the data.

“Dad, Hold the countdown. I need to ask you something.”

Alan looked at Jet with a surprised look. If Jet thought something was amiss, he knew better than to ignore it.

“Ma3a, hold digitization.” He called.

“Threshold exceeded. Safety interlocks removed. Process committed” came the reply.

Dr Gulimin realized something was very wrong and started to get a worried look. He initially began to move towards his daughter.

“Jet, what’s wrong” screamed Alison as the noise in the room went up.

Then the laser fired.

It took 0.3 seconds for the laser to digitize Melanie into the frame buffer of the fiber loop memory.

It took about 0.7 seconds later for the alarms to start sounding.

Suddenly the cool green light was overridden by red warning lights that suddenly illuminated all over the Encom digitization floor. Each had a common factor. They were evacuation signs.

“Warning,” came Ma3a’s voice. “Quantum instability fluctuations detected in fiber loop 3. Digitization process unstable. Evacuate the digitizing pad immediately.”

Somewhere in the building an evacuation siren had started whooping.

“What’s happening?” screamed Alison.

Next: Chapter 2.15 – Adaption Layer.