Inside Job
A Downtime Café Story
By Dana Short
Of all the people to get me involved in something like this, Terry is the last one I would have picked. I mean, I’m not even sure Terry is real. Of course for that matter, I can’t really be sure I am either, but both I and my good friend and coworker Sally are sure we are, just as sure as we are that the bus boy, Billy isn’t.
So what nefarious scheme has Terry gotten us involved in? Helping a guest follow events at midnight on new years eve, 2000.
In case you didn’t know, when you book a vacation with Time Travel Incorporated, you are able to chose any destination in the world, but with a name like TTI, you probably would not be surprised to know that you also get to select the timeframe.
When Terrance Rendlow, the now deceased creator of TTI’s system designed it, it was intended to be a historical simulator, allowing up to fifty researchers to share up to four “Wavefronts” in a virtual past. He filled the computers with all the available data from the 20th century, both statistical and historical, and then started the overprocessors up to run the world from it’s starting point, hitting all the known historical waypoints any way they could. Granted, once you start throwing people into the simulation, the overprocessors sometimes have a hard time hitting some of those waypoints, and in some cases, they have to give up entirely.
Anyhow, by design, the system only supports dates from January 1st, 1901 through December 31st, 2000, however, there is some leeway. Technically, according to Hank, our IT guy, the actual database truncates on January 31st, 2001. So that is how I can be out here, standing in the rain, waiting for a van to drive by so I can follow it on my bike – at 12:25am on January 1st, 2001.
Which brings me back to how Terry, of all people managed to convince Shelly and I to spend one of our days off, helping Mr. Jeffer’s trail a van. For all the good it will likely do. I mean, if you haven’t figured it out yet, everything in here is a simulation. About as real as a bouquet of plastic flowers. Nothing in here really matches the real world, unless it’s one of those aforementioned waypoints, and even then the accuracy is questionable. This is why TTI sells vacations instead of research trips to university students. Of course, most university students wouldn’t be able to pay the $75,000 to $100,000 that a 3 week trip Inside runs these days. Fortunately for TTI, there are several CEO types out there who find it quite useful to be able to decompress for three weeks, and then return to work only a day after they left. And even at $100,000 a head they find the service offered to be quite an attractive deal. Which is one of the reasons TTI doesn’t have to advertise, they only have 40 slots they can sell on the system, since it can only handle 50 people total, and they need to keep some employees Inside to handle emergencies for the guests. And since Mr. Rendlow took the secrets of exactly how the code in the overprocessors works with him to the grave, until the programming types in R&D can replicate the software he wrote, they are stuck with the single system they have. At least they understand how the hardware works, so they can fix that much it when it breaks, and they can reinitialize the system and set the wavefronts, maintenance things like that. It’s just building the whole thing from scratch that has eluded them thus far.
Some headlights on the road were about the only warning I got, before the van I had been waiting for swooshed around the corner, splashing me with a bow wave from both sets of tires, then speeding off into the distance. I looked at my watch, and it read “12:27am”, yep, this should be the van. There would be no other reason for a beat up old Volkswagen van to be hauling ass on this road at this time.
Keying the mike on the radio, I spoke five soft words into the boom mike on my helmet, “I Got the van here.”, then cursing Terry once again, I kickstarted my bike and pulled out into the darkness following the dim tail lights of the departing van. Hopefully, I would be able to find out what roads it took, while hauling it’s cargo of stolen art and jewelry to wherever it was heading. As I headed out, I thought back again to the conversation which had landed me here, driving a unlighted motorcycle through the cold rain in the first hours of this century.
I had been at my customary place at the bar, my usual white rag in my hand, wiping down the polish on the bartop – it’s strange the things we do habitually here on the Inside, despite the fact that especially in the Café or the Tower behind it, the system can keep things clean and neat all by it’s self.
“Hey, Jake”, came an unfamiliar musical female voice from behind me. I turned around, and was greeted by the smiling face of a tall blonde girl, perhaps eighteen at most, wearing white industrial clothing, and a name tag with the line, “Hi, my name is Terry How can I help you have a better day?” While I hadn’t seen the girl before in my life, that tag I knew. It belonged to our cook.
“Hi Terry” I replied, “What’s up?”
She looked over at me, biting her lower lip speculatively, “Jake, what are you doing tomorrow, any plans for your ‘Day off’?”
I thought about it. I had intended to spend the day relaxing in my apartment, perhaps hit the beach in Malibu, as I think there is a front running right now through July of ‘74 at present, and I always liked the beaches better in the ‘70s for some reason.
“Nothing particular, why?”
“There’s a guest who could use some help. He has, well, he has sort of a mission,” she began, glancing over her shoulder at one of Shelly’s tables. Sitting there was a familiar looking middle aged gentleman, a glass of what looked like Iced Tea, and a partially eaten sundae of some sort before him.
“What kind of help?” I asked, wondering if I had to deal with another disgruntled guest, someone who’s vacation plans had not worked out quite as intended.
“Well, there was a robbery, you see. Or rather, there will be one. Tomorrow night, in California, during New Years. Exactly at midnight, someone will cut the alarm lines to an estate, sneak in, and make off with a small pile of artwork, and jewelry, never to be seen or heard from again. The artwork, not the person. The person in question will leave a single fingerprint where it shouldn’t be, however, due to an alibi which places them at a party an hour’s drive away, an alibi bolstered by several photos, and eye witnesses, there will be no prosecution. And the artwork will vanish forever. Our guest, Mr. Jeffer, it was his family who was robbed. While none of the pictures taken were very valuable, there was a lot of sentimental value attached to both the pictures, and the jewelry which was stolen. It has been a mystery to him ever since he was a teenager what happened to it. Seeing as how there is a front rolling through the night in question tomorrow, he’d like to try and watch events unfold himself. However, to really do so, he would need to be in four places at the same time, at the party where the pictures were taken, at the house where the burglary takes place, and the road leading away from the house, to follow the van, whichever way it went. I’ve offered to cover the road to the east. I was hoping you would take the road to the west, and Shelly would be willing to cover the party. If the van goes by, we’ll follow it at a distance, and see where it ends up. It can’t be far, as the suspect was certainly at home by 5 in the morning, ostensibly in bed asleep, when the police came calling. Ron, or Mr. Jeffer, if you prefer, thinks the van had to be stashed within a few miles of the house, likely somewhere between the house and the party. The only downside is that it was raining that night, pretty heavily, so you can expect to get wet. Will you help?”
I thought about it for a bit. I recognized the guest in question. He was as close to a frequent visitor as one could expect here, probably showing up once a month or so in Real Time, or about once a year by my own reckoning. That was pretty often, considering the prices TTI charges. If my spending a night slogging through mud and rain would make a guest happy, then that was really part of my job. Even if it was my supposed ‘Day Off’.
“Ok, I’m in. I suppose I can have Hank zap me up a bike and some nice rain clothes.” I replied.
“Already taken care of. Nice Honda off-road bike, with a big muffler. Even zapped us up a set of military spec spread spectrum radios and NVDs so we could keep in touch.”
“Ok, did you talk to Shelly yet, or do you want me to?” I asked her.
“I’ll do it. I don’t think it will be too hard to convince her to go to an exclusive New Year’s Eve party for the rich and famous, even if she does have to watch a certain couple all evening to see if, when, and how they took the exonerating photos. Hopefully she can also spot when the suspect leaves, and how he goes..”
“Ok then,” I replied, “When and where should I meet you?”
“Tomorrow evening. No need to spend more time in the rain than necessary, I’ll see if Hank can get a door for you right along the road where you should wait. That way, you don’t have to even head in ‘till a bit after midnight, when the heist is going down.”
“Ok.” I replied, sealing my fate, as she grinned and turned to head off and hoodwink Shelly into her part in this questionable scheme.
So it came to pass that earlier this evening, I had met Hank at the Tower Garage, and he had obligingly opened the doors to a tin shed just off this soggy California road, and let me walk the bike out and into the rain. On the other side of the door, my watch read “12:11am 01-01-01 PST” and I keyed the mike for the radio built into the helmet Hank had given me. “Terry?” I asked.
“Yes?” A deep male voice came rumbling back through the headphones.
“I’m in position.” I replied.
“Ok”, he answered. “The job is already well under way, almost half the stuff is already in the van, according to Ron. Shelly said the suspect left the party through a back door at about ten fifty, which would have left just barely enough time to get here and start to work on the security system. While there were plenty of pictures taken, there aren’t enough to match the officer’s counts yet. If as I now suspect, he’s going to head back to the party, he’ll most likely be taking your road out, although we know he swapped the corvette he left the party in for the old van he has with him now somewhere along the way. Be to let me know as soon as the van passes, if it does. Ron and I’ll want to join you as soon as possible. I wish I had thought to have Hank set up a second doorway on this side so we could take a shortcut through the Garage. Darnit.”
Thinking that would have been a clever idea, and agreeing it was too bad no one had considered it beforehand, I again keyed my mike and replied, “Gotcha. I’ll let you know as soon as the van comes by.”
“Don’t forget, keep your lights off, and don’t get too close to it, but also don’t let it get out of your sight. This is likely our only shot at this with Ron for quite a while. If we blow it tonight, it may be years before another simulation is here to give us another shot.”
“I got it,” I replied, “Although I don’t know what good even this shot is, after all, this is just a simulation. We both know it has about as much relationship to reality as a bad dream.”
“Now Jake, you know that’s not exactly true. After all, the simulations are based on real information. Granted, any actions by guests or staff can and will skew the results, but left alone, the simulations will always flow to the known conclusions. That’s the way it works. So, as long as we only observe, and don’t do anything to influence the outcome, this simulation may be as close to reliving the events in question as it is possible to come. The key is that none of us have any discernable effect on the outcome. Which is why it is so important you don’t turn on your bike’s lights, or get spotted somehow.”
“Ok, Terry. I get the picture. While I still think this is a futile task of chasing a will-o-the-whisp, I’ll do what I can.” And that is how I ended up here, riding my bike along the muddy road in the middle of the night, in the dark. Talk about fun. At least the helmet had a Night Vision Display built in. That must have been something Terry had Hank whip up specially for this job, as unlike the radios, I didn’t think they had flat screen NVDs back in the oughts, even for the military.
Distantly, over the rush of wind, the swish of rain, and the rumble of my bikes heavily muffled engine, I could hear the grinding of the van’s transmission as it shifted gears to handle the decent down the hill I was almost ready to crest. Behind me, I thought I could faintly hear another pair of engines. Hopefully it was Ron and Terry coming up behind me, and not someone else who would accidentally crush me in the darkness. A glance at the mirror showed no lights. I took that as a good sign as I crested the hill myself, and followed the van down the other side, towards the nearby highway.
As I made it to the bottom of the hill, and turned onto the highway myself, a pair of bikes pulled up out of the darkness behind me, and took up places both to my left and right. “Jake?” came the deep male voice, apparently belonging to Terry tonight.
“Unless you know some other idiot who’d be riding a motorcycle with it’s lights off in the dark on a rainy new years.” I replied sardonically.
The van kept to the highway for almost fifteen miles, before suddenly slowing and pulling over to the side of the road, then taking a dirt path off shoulder, and away from the highway. The rain had converted the path to a slick river of mud, which the van sloshed it’s way down, disappearing through the trees before we had even made it to the point it had left the road.
“Damn, I never even noticed this trail before,” a new voice broke in over the radio. “I wonder if it’s still there.”
“Ron?” I asked.
“Yep. Thanks for helping out on this, by the way. I sure appreciate it. When I asked Terry about the possibility, I hadn’t realized just how difficult it would be to trace down all the loose ends at once. You and Shelly helping out is a break.”
“No problem. I would have likely been sitting in a hot tub with some California Cuties listing to 70’s music if I wasn’t here, slogging over a mud trail in the rain with you. Not a big deal. I’d have been about as wet either way.”
Ron laughed, and we headed carefully up the trail after the vanished van.
A ways into the woods, the trail split. If it hadn’t been for the splashed mud heading off to the left, towards the Cliffside, we’d most likely have headed on to the right, paralelling the highway back the way we’d come. However, the recently splashed mud still dripping off the foliage marked the way for us to follow as plainly as a genuine road sign would have.
“What the heck could be up here, as far as I know, the river cuts a gorge from the canyon up this way. No one ever built anything up here, so why is there even a road?” Ron asked.
Noticing some lights up ahead, we suddenly stopped the bikes, and looked around. Unfortunately, the foliage was too thick to take our bikes off the path, and the mud too soft to leave the bikes standing by themselves, so we walked them the last bit up the trail, until we could see the source of the lights.
A corvette was parked in a muddy clearing, with it’s headlamps illuminating an opening in the cliff side. What looked like an old mine had been recently reopened, and the van had been driven a ways inside. A man was now in the process of moving several pieces of wood back over the opening, tacking them down with nails, to make it look like it was still closed off and abandoned.
“So that’s where he stashed it! DAMN! I knew he had to have hidden it somewhere around here.” Ron muttered.
“Uh, guys, we’d better head back out of here, if we don’t want to get caught when he leaves.” Terry noted.
Slowly, we backed the bikes back down the hill, away from the cliff, until we got to somewhat more level ground where we could fire up the engines and head back down the trail to the highway.
“So what now?” I asked. “Is the mystery solved, or do we have more to do still?”
Terry chuckled, and answered, “Just the last act, we should meet with Shelly and join the party in time to see our thief make his re-entry and get some more pictures taken. Shelly has an RV with her, and there are clean, dry clothes in it for all of us.” He said.
Following Terry, we headed back to the highway, and on down it another twenty miles, ‘till he had us pull out in front of a large house. The lights in the yard were all on, and the accumulated vehicles parked in front of it were plainly visible. Also visible was a single Valet driver, standing miserably under an umbrella just before the front door. Among the vehicles parked off to the side, and around towards the back, a large white RV stood out noticeably, and it was to this that Terry led us.
My watch read “1:04 AM” when we banged in through the door of the RV, and Terry tossed me a towel and a paper bag obviously containing clothes. He gestured towards the bedroom in the back, and said “You want to dry off and change there?”
I nodded, and headed for the rear room, as Terry assigned the miniscule bathroom to Ron, while tossing him a second sack and towel. The third sack, apparently held clothes sized for his large muscular frame.
It took me only about four minutes to squirm out of my soggy jeans, socks, underwear, boots, and shirt. Leaving the muddy mess on the floor, I transferred my wallet to the clean dress slacks from the sack, pulled on the silky dress shirt, and after donning the clean, dry underwear and socks, pulled the black slacks up my legs, and stepped into the shiny leather shoes. Fully dressed, I picked up the dress jacket, also from the sack, transferred my soggy clothes back into the bag, and cautiously opened the door, “You ready?” I called.
A light, soprano voice floated back to me ,”Of course.”
Opening the door fully, I was greeted by the sight of a diminutive young Asian woman, perhaps twenty three, wearing a curve hugging black and white PVC party dress.
“I see you changed” I said, sardonically.
“Of course” she said, smiling brightly. “I thought this was better for the party.”
Shaking my head, I said, “Some day, Terry, we’re going to have to have a long talk.”
Suddenly serious, she said, “It will be a very long talk, Jake. But it won’t be today. Nor tomorrow. The time is not yet right. And it may not be so for quite a while.”
Feeling a chill chase it’s self up then back down my spine, I shivered, then as suddenly as it vanished, her smile re-appeared, and she called out, “Ron, you ready for the last act?”
Emerging from the bathroom, Ron finished straightening the bolo tie he had wrapped around his neck, then shrugged into the black leather jacket he held in his hand. “As ready as I’ll ever be”, he replied.
Pulling a set of three umbrellas from a rack next to the door, she handed each of us one, then followed us out the door, and down the back path towards the house. Shelly met us at the rear door, a cell-phone held lightly in her left hand. “She’s still in there, mingling. She keeps looking at the door to the hall that leads to this door, so I think she is expecting him any time. How’d it go? Terry told me you found a mine where he stashed the van?”
“Yep. He was just finishing closing off the front when we left. Assuming he followed us as quickly as he could, he should about be here by now.”
Even as I said that, a car drove up the back lane, with it’s head lamps off, and snugged into a spot in the Valet lot beside the house. We watched as a figure clad in mud splattered transparent plastic rainclothes climbed out, and headed towards the house at a dash.
Ducking in through the door, we slipped into a room just off the hallway, where we could see as the figure came in through the back door, and headed down the hall, pausing to literally tear the plastic off his form, before stuffing it into a wastebasket in the bathroom oposite the room we were in.
Following down the hall, we watched as he rejoined his girlfriend, and after she fiddled with her camera for a bit, he posed for some pictures with various guests. In between each set of pictures, the woman would fiddle a bit more with the camera.
“So that’s how he did it.” Ron muttered.
I looked over at the man, who pointed at the woman and the camera. “That’s one of those cameras which puts the time and date on the picture. She’s changing the clock between each photo. I would bet that when you look at the film, you’ll see that the time on each picture she took this evening flows from the time they actually arrived, on through midnight, and up to the time the party breaks up and everyone goes home… What’s more, since the car’s in the Valet lot, he can get that poor wet boy out front to swear he never left. That’s why, even with the fingerprint, they wouldn’t even consider him a suspect. His alibi was too airtight.”
“So, what now?” I asked.
“Just wait.” Terry said, glancing up at Ron, “I know this isn’t going to help make things any better in the real world, but perhaps, it will at least provide a bit more closure for you.”
As she said that, the front door opened, and the wet Valet entered, along with a mud splattered Sheriff and several deputies. “John Andrews?” he called.
The name sounded familiar to me, and I turned to see a much younger version of a guest we had had several cycles ago, turn nervously towards the door and the police waiting within it’s threshold.
“Yes?” asked the man we had been following all evening.
“Please come with us, sir. You are wanted in connection to the break in at the Jeffer place a while ago. A tip lead us to the van in the mine, and the prints match those found at the scene, which also match those we have of you from your service record. If there is any mud in or on your car that matches that at the mine, you’ll have some serious questions to answer.” The Sheriff said.
As they led the man out the door, clad only in his socks, his shoes having been removed and placed in a plastic bag, Ron smiled a grim smile of satisfaction. “I know that bastard is only a simulated ghost of the real one, but you were right, Terry, it does my heart good to see at least this shade of him head off to the justice he so deserves.”
Terry took that moment to pull out a cell phone from her purse, and hitting the speed-dial, she waited a few beats before speaking, “Hey Oogie. Terry here. Could you arrange a door here in the house to get us home without having to go back out into the rain?” A few moments of silence on our end, then she nodded, and replied, “Thanks, Oogie. You’re a dear.”
With that, she flipped her phone closed, and said, “Well, the show’s over for tonight, what do you say we blow this joint, and get some much deserved sleep.” As she headed towards the hallway leading back towards the kitchen and the rear door, she swerved a bit to whisper in the ear of one of the deputies who was still standing by the front door for something. She nodded towards John’s girlfriend, who still stood there holding the camera as though trying to figure out what she should do. The Deputy nodded, and approached the woman, murmured something to her, then gently took the camera from her hands, before leading her towards the front door, and the waiting police cars outside.
We followed Terry down the back hall, and out the back door, only we found ourselves stepping out the back door of the Café, into the dimly lighted courtyard between it and the Tower, the swimming pools off to our left, and the Tennis Courts and further on, the golf courses, to our right.
“Well, I’m wiped out” Terry said, before giving us a wave, and heading towards the Tower. “Jake, I may be in a bit late tomorrow, but I should be there for Lunch, and certianly for Dinner. Thanks again for helping out. Shelly, I want to thank you as well. Don’t forget that shopping trip I promised you!” With that, she vanished into the darkness along the path to the Tower.
“Jake, I just want to thank you and Shelly again as well.”, Ron said, extending his hand, “I know this was not a part of your Job Descriptions, for either of you, in fact from what Terry said, you both did this on what should be your days off. I just want you to know that I really appreciate your helping me put this mystery to bed for me. Now, if I’m really lucky, that bastard hasn’t moved the van to this day – after all, the whole reason he stole them in the first place was simply for the challenge and because my father had pissed him off – he certainly didn’t need the money, so I cant see why he would risk getting caught again later by trying to recover and sell anything. Most likely, both the van, the jewels, and whatever’s left of the pictures are still in the mine.”
“And if he really did leave fingerprints there, that may actually be enough evidence to finally get the police to charge him.” Shelly offered.
“On what charge? The statute of limitations would have expired on the theft long ago,” he asked.
“On possession of stolen goods. Even though he may not have them on his property, although it would be interesting to know who owns that mine, if his prints are all over them, then a case could be made that he knew of their location, and his refusal to do his duty to return them to their rightful owner could be a chargable offence by it’s self.”
Ron perked up at the thought, and gave Shelly a hug before heading towards the Tower, and likely his waiting room.
I looked over at Shelly, and asked, “Shopping trip?” as I also turned to head towards the Tower myself, feeling an almost magnetic attraction resonating from the bed in my suite.
She grinned, and said, “Yep. Paris. In the 1920s. Should be lots of fun. Terry said she’d take me in two cycles. That there is supposed to be a group coming to visit a bunch of speakeasys, and jin joints or something, and she thinks a trip to Paris at that time for some shopping would be a fun outing. She promised to take me along.” She explained as we entered the lobby and stepped into one of the waiting elevators, each hitting our own floors from the rows of buttons.
“And all I got out of this was a ‘Thank You, and I’ll be late tomorrow, Boss.’ I should have held out for more. ,” I grumbled as the elevator dinged, and the doors opened on Shelly’s floor, “Well, I’ll see you tomorrow, Shelly.”
“Night Jake,” she called, stepping out and waving as the doors closed once more, the elevator surging up towards my floor, and my waiting bed.
So, as I lay here, getting ready to drift off to sleep, I have to wonder, did what we saw tonight really match what happened in the world outside? And if it did, how could that be possible. And even more worryingly, what was it that Terry wanted to talk to me about, ‘When the time is right’? With that last thought, I closed my eyes, and let my mind go blank. To sleep, perchance to dream, within the dream which is the Inside. Seems kind of futile, doesn’t it?
The End.
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