The Scarab (5 page)

This year’s convention started the second Thursday of
December in Albuquerque, New Mexico, using the Sandia supercomputer network. It
was a high-security net, but the SimCon consortium had obtained special
permission to use the computers for this week. The cab driver, Omar, said we
passed the Sandia security compound on the way from Albuquerque International Airport. I gawked at the mountains which hemmed in the city to the south and east.

He said “They are the Sandia Mountains. It is good for the hot air balloons. We have a festival here every
October for that. It is a very busy time, dangerous to drive in because
everybody is looking up at the sky.”

“There might be a few dangerous drivers
at this event, too,” I countered.

Omar laughed at this. Encouraged,
he became a fountain of tourist information. “Would you like to go on a brief
detour to see the scenic Rio Grande? It is not far. Out by the park I know a
place with a once-in-a-lifetime view. Very nice.”

I begged off because I had to check
in early that afternoon. He let me off easy because business was booming today.
Over half the cabs in the city were making round trips from the airport to the
arena and back again.

Omar dropped me at the arena entrance.
The indoor sports and music center had been transformed from a warehouse in the
desert to a Mecca, drawing enthusiasts from the world over. I took off my
sunglasses and stared like a yokel at the state fair. The sheer size of the
arena made the hordes of people look like worker ants swarming a mound. I didn’t
notice how loud the background noise of talking and sound testing was until I
had to raise my voice to ask the door guard which direction I should go to
register.

“Press crew?” he shouted.

“Contestant,” I said holding up my
photo badge. He squinted at it, and back at me. “I shaved the beard.” I
wondered briefly if Mary would recognize me without it, or like the change. I
felt like a department store dummy in my crisp, new cotton clothes. Everything
about me was awkwardly new, even my underwear.

He nodded and pointed to the other
end of the complex at a pair of gold-embossed sliding-glass doors. “All you’ve
got to do is pick up your room key, sir. Shall I radio someone for your luggage?”

I shook my head and hefted the
small black nylon bag over my shoulder. “Nope. I always travel light.”

I knew what to expect from the
increasing video coverage over the past few years, but even I ogled at the
giant race score boards, panoramic view screens, and sheer techno-glitz
surrounding the event. In the glassed-in press booth, high above the milling
multitudes were the news-casters from local stations, ESPN, and MTV. They were
getting set up for the crowd reactions and big flying-logo opening of this year’s
coverage. MTV was going all out and had sent reporters to all major real-world
sites along the simulated race route. They planned to mix sound-effects, a
backdrop of European scenery, and spectators from the arena to create the
illusion of an old-style grand-prix.

When I walked through the glass
doors into the Windsor Hotel, I immediately entered yet another foreign world.
The sudden lack of sound was staggering. The air was a perfect 74 degrees,
making me aware that I had been sweating during my walk through the arena. This
was hands-down the most elegant hotel I had ever seen. The floor and front desk
were all a polished, beige stone from the local desert called “fossil stone.”
This transitioned to a tan, marble fountain on one side and a plush, maroon
carpet leading to the elevators on the other. The arched ceiling was inset with
carved stone rosettes and even the security cameras had tasteful gold trim. I
wasn’t certain, but the painting behind the front desk looked like El Greco.
The brass plaque beneath it proclaimed it to be a gift of gratitude from some
sultan.

Although there were twelve people
waiting, the six clerks served us promptly, and it was soon my turn in line.
After showing my passport and photo badge, the clerk handed me a copy of the
schedule for the week’s festivities, and a small plastic credit card. It had a
DeClerk logo on it, and the legend “Team Lead.”

“That will serve as your room key
as well as your expense account during your stay here. Please type your
pre-selected password into this console for confirmation, sir,” said the man
who looked and sounded like David Niven playing the butler in an old Disney
movie. I typed CINDERELLA, trying to block the camera’s view of the key pad.

When the green light came on, Mr.
Niven handed me a black matchbox with prongs on the end. “This is your personal
encryption device, courtesy of the Windsor. It attaches to your terminal and
guarantees secure communication with the Sandia network. Do know how this
device works?”

I shook my head.

Niven explained. “There are two
large prime numbers on this device—a public one which you share with everyone,
and a private one which not even you get to look at. Messages encoded using the
private key may be read by anyone using the public key. This device also
affixes a unique digital signature to the end of all transactions. You will be
held responsible to honor anything signed with it.”

“What if someone steals my box?”

“The private key is activated only
by the password you just typed. If you wish, we can arrange for fingerprint or
voiceprint verification instead,” he said, trying to be accommodating. Perhaps
he mistook my ignorance for dissatisfaction. “We have a duplicate of each key
in our vault in the event your key becomes lost or damaged, but require a 2000
dollar deposit and approval from a race judge before we may issue a
replacement.”

“This will be sufficient,” I
muttered, pocketing the gizmo.

“Do you understand and agree to
these conditions under the authority of the SimCon Racing Consortium?”

I looked at the pile of paperwork.
Hell, too late to back out now. They’ve already got the money. “Sure.” I signed
the authorization for SimCon to kick me out at any time for reasons specified
within their charter. Now it was real. I was in THE race.

“What if I want other people to be
able to use my key, other members of my team?”

“Normally, a team rents a unit for
each member. The first one is provided as a courtesy.”

I grimaced at the thought of two
thousand plus per unit. “We just have the one terminal. Only differing
passwords will be necessary, I think.”

“Very good, sir,” he said, sounding
like someone who had just stepped in dog droppings. “We can fit up to three
additional pilots on the unit at no cost.”

While I signed another paper to add
Mary Ann, Foxworthy, and Ghedra itself (the remote control and autopilot) up to
the access list, Mr. Niven plugged my unit into the security console. “Please
type a unique password for each, and affix your digital signature at the
bottom.”

I chose “Fast_Lady” for Mare in
view of her history of high-speed chases, “Phi|adelphia” for Foxworthy, and “the
Scarab” for Ghedra.

Mr. Niven explained apologetically
that since I had signed on so late, all they had left was a puny three-room
palace on the shady side of the building on the twentieth story. He raised an
eyebrow when I refused a bellhop for my bags, but continued his well-rehearsed
speech without skipping a beat.

“Sir, welcome to the Windsor. We hope you enjoy your stay. Your interface station has been connected in the den.
The hospitality suite is number 215”

The bellhop went with me up the
elevator anyway. Whether to make sure I found my way or so I wouldn’t bother
the other guests, I wasn’t certain.

“Ms. Anselm checked in an hour ago.
Will the other members of your team be arriving by the scouting run?” he asked,
making polite conversation.

“I’m not sure. I haven’t heard from
my ... secretary. For now assume it’s just us.”

On my door, I found a note on hotel
stationery. Because I could already tell it was from Mary, I waited until I was
inside to open it. The common room was more than I expected, with black-leather
furniture, a fully stocked bar, and a single rose on the glass coffee table.
Throwing my bag into the nearest bedroom, I read the note with eager
anticipation.

“Meet you at the booth for DeClerk
Enterprises. - M.”

Humph. I suppose for a hundred G’s
they throw in a lot of freebies. I plucked the rose from the vase, put on my
new sport’s jacket (purchased for this occasion) and headed back to the
elevator. The door locked behind me, saying good-bye as I left.

Downstairs, there was a maze of
three-dimensional, living car ads, salesmen pushing flyers and models stroking
rotating displays. I tried to knock over as few of them as possible locating
stall D-twenty-nine. It wasn’t hard to find, a slice of barrenness in all of
this hype. It was a gray curtain framing our company’s name and three computer
graphics. The pictures were of the three entries in the event, along with
three-sentence specifications and the qualifying run ratings. My designs scored
high on economy and defensibility, but low on virtually everything else. Out of
a field of thirty-five teams, and ninety-five vehicles, the speed of my middleweight
entry placed me in position seventy-five, one ahead of the body of heavyweight
competitors. My pole position would change drastically after the first race.

Here was the booth, but no Mary.

The salesman in the booth next to
mine was a slimy, business type who probably pushed vegetable dicers on TV. I
asked him if he’d seen Mare. He answered, “Is this your booth? We didn’t think
anyone would be here. Everyone else set up camp at 6:30 this morning. Cripes,
you have to bribe half the janitorial force to get extra electricity.”

“Use mine,” I said, looking around
for Mary’s face.

“Really? How are you going to
advertise?”

I looked at the glorified tin-can
he was selling in naked disdain. “By winning. Have you seen anybody hanging
around here?”

“Just the convention detective. She
grabbed a purse snatcher. Cuffed him, frisked him, and hauled his butt away in
under ninety seconds. She was a beauty.”

“5’ 8”, nice legs, and a purse that
looks like Salvador Dali gone paisley?”

“Yep. 36-26-38, or close to it.”

“That’s my bodyguard. Which way did
she go?”

He pointed, wordlessly. I ended up
at the security station. They wouldn’t let me in, but said Mary Ann would meet
me in our suite in another thirty minutes when she finished her police
statement. Security did, however, pass her the rose for me. In return, I
received a thin box, four inches by ten, wrapped in a single red ribbon. It
contained a pair of leather, racing gloves, which I promptly put on. They fit
perfectly.

Unfortunately, this left me with
time to kill because the reconnaissance session didn’t start till noon, and it
wasn’t past 10:30 yet. I was already getting pre-game jitters. I needed a
distraction, but not the circus out in the arena. I decided to go to room 215,
where they served the free drinks and people bragged loudly in earshot of rival
companies. I might get the scoop on my competition or find a kindred spirit
amidst the hopeful drivers.

The hospitality suite overlooked
the convention floor and had no fewer than fifty suits in it, a quarter of them
smoked like chimneys. All the ties were making me itch already. On the big
screen, they were showing the pre-race review by ESPN. I picked at the hors-d’oeuvres,
half-listening to the commercial barrage around me as I waited. This year’s LAS
fleet had four members : the Roman, a luxury limousine; the Times, a simple four-door
car for the price of a Mercedes; the Turn-pica Elite, a touring sedan designed
for long trips; and the Sans Serif, an economy car with no frills for $25,999.

I avoided most of the stuffed
shirts in the room successfully while ignoring their glory-grabbing. They had
neither designed nor built a single machine, but were claiming credit for all
the advances of modern society. I’m certain not one of them could explain a
common TV, let alone why they chose to use certain compression ratios in their
floaters. They were all packagers and marketers with no grounding in reality,
with the possible exception of the little balding man in the far corner who
scribbled notes from time to time on a green steno-pad.

I was about to ask him why he didn’t
use a lap-top PC like everyone else, when I passed too close to a heated
bar-room argument. “You can’t say that. It’s a revolutionary design, heralding
a new era. It’ll blow the doors off anything out there. The Trans-Siberian will
pull into first place by the third hour.”

The Trans-Siberian Motor Company
was a Russian venture with several private investors from all around Europe. The idea was to use old Soviet weapons factories to produce something usable in
peace time. They had already produced an assortment of vehicles for NATO and
were now advancing into the private sector. From the repair work I had done on
a local vehicle, their products were inferior reproductions of more successful
cars on the market, all look and no substance. The only good thing I remember
hearing was that the heater worked well.

“No. I agree it’s revolutionary,
but too much for the common people. I think you’ll be in the top ten during the
first leg, but people still won’t buy it. What do you think, you’re a Team
Lead,” he asked me.

“Oh, that’s just a knock-off of
last year’s Sartori without the spiffy upholstery and bar. Not even a good
copy, at that.” It was just an off-handed comment, but several conversations
around the room ground to a halt.

“What’s wrong with it?” asked one
offended gentleman in a charcoal-gray Saville-Row.

I popped a handful of peanuts into
my mouth and looked again at the overhead view screen. “The bolts holding it to
the frame will probably pop at the first high-g turn. The Sartori had special
composites for the rivet sites and a maximum cruising speed of about 100 km/h.
The new copy is heavier, faster, but not as well designed. I can’t see it from
the outside, but I bet they even failed to correct the seam leak that makes the
tail-lights shatter every time it rains. I wouldn’t drive it.”