Fireworks erupted in his mind.
Like a neuronal big bang, his consciousness expanded to fill a universe that hadn’t existed the moment before. A feeling that was now quite familiar to him, but was always exhilarating.
He knew instantly. The video footage Kira had seen was accurate. All of it.
Desh could see himself killing the men in the safe-house basement in his mind’s eye like it was happening that moment. He felt the handle of the knife as its sharp blade sliced through each man’s carotid artery with surgical precision. He knew his slower self would find the memory grisly, and would find the utter helplessness of these men horrifying. But he knew it was neither. Killing them had increased his and Kira’s chances of success and survival, nothing more.
But there was no longer any reason not to let his dimwitted self have access to these memories, given the circumstances. Suspecting he had a false memory was driving this other Desh mad, and maintaining this fiction would help neither of them any longer.
He searched his mind in an instant and knew he harbored no other secrets from himself. Other than this one false memory of the events in the basement, he had played it straight with his dimwitted alter ego.
His normal self would remember his enhanced self had not been hiding anything else, but of course, that version of him could never know for certain if this was just another implanted memory. Not even he, with all of his brilliance, had an answer for this conundrum.
He manipulated Kira’s computer, digesting entire screens of information in a literal blink of the eye. He caused the computer to spit up page after page of time-stamped logs, indicating to the tenth of a second every session Kira had ever had on the computer. He crosschecked this against his memories, which he could pinpoint precisely in time to match the records of the computer.
A pattern emerged. For several hours each week, Kira Miller was engaged in computer work that she either didn’t know about, or was concealing from him. He found hidden files, imbedded in innocent programs, which were set to automatically transfer to yet another file—this one not only well concealed but tightly protected.
And even he couldn’t break in.
There was no encryption that could be written by a normal, no matter how expert, that he couldn’t break through in minutes in his current state. Which meant this one was built by another enhanced mind. It was the only possibility. A mind even more capable than his own.
Laptops were prohibited from the enhancement room. Only the main Icarus computer could be accessed from here to ensure online activity was properly monitored and controlled to prevent the sort of mischief Jake had taken part in. But Kira had obviously disregarded this rule, had encrypted this large file on her laptop while enhanced. She was the keeper of the pills, and accounted for them, so she could use them off the record any time she wanted.
Desh continued searching, probing; trying to piece together and read whatever tea leaves he could find, no matter how ephemeral. He made attempt after attempt, beating his genius against the computer’s will like a diamond sledgehammer.
Finally, a measure of success. Hints of files that had been erased, but which he could reconstruct just enough of to make them somewhat meaningful. A little more than two and a half years ago Kira had done considerable research on world affairs, wars, infighting, political systems, dictatorships, and nuclear capabilities of countries around the world. She had actively searched for the Achilles’ heels of world governments, gaps in their defenses, pressure points. She had studied the effects of various stimuli; military, political, and economic, on world order, paying particularly close attention to those that would cause widespread devastation. This work was barely concealed at all.
A few months later she had broken into classified government computers that held detailed information on the construction of weapons of mass destruction, both nuclear and biological. But this work, which had occupied her for considerable time, was far better encrypted, so much so that even with a mind of incalculable power, he was only able to nibble around the edges.
Then, abruptly, she must have instituted an even tighter layer of security, and he wasn’t able to catch even a whiff of the skunk she had trapped inside her files. He was completely shut out from that day forward.
What did this all mean? Had she thrown in the towel? Had she given up on faster-than-light travel, on infinity, and decided to take matters into her own hands and thin the human herd—for its own good? To reduce the population so her longevity discovery could be revealed?
Good for you, Kira, he thought. Finally making the tough choices without artificial ethics and morals—throwbacks to early human development that were now as unnecessary as a pair of tonsils—getting in the way.
Or was her intent something else entirely? He had only seen the tip of the tip of the iceberg, and since this was being orchestrated by the enhanced version of Kira Miller, it could be one hell of an iceberg.
Regardless, he needed to find out. And his dumber half could assist in this effort.
But better to keep this from Kira herself. Whether she knew about it or not, anything he did to tip her off would tip off her enhanced self as well.
And if that were to happen, then his investigation would be over before it started.
And as arrogant as he was in his current state, as supremely brilliant, an enhanced Kira Miller was the one entity against whom he knew he would be overmatched.
33
Desh knocked on the door of the yellow one-story home that was straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Small but impeccably well kept, with a bright white picket fence in front that was as quaint as it was cliché.
An older man opened the door. He had white hair and was obviously retired, but he had a vigor to him that suggested his retirement had been recent and he continued to stay active.
“Dr. Arnold Cohen?” said Desh.
“Yes,” replied the man at the door. “And you must be Detective Nelson.”
“That’s right,” said Desh, “David Nelson.” He held up a fake badge, which was a flawless forgery, but which he might as well have pulled from a cereal box for all the scrutiny Cohen gave it.
Desh gestured to Jim Connelly beside him. “And this is my associate, Lieutenant Jim Tyler. Thanks for agreeing to meet with us.”
Since Desh had made the initial contact, they had decided he would do most of the talking while Connelly would take notes.
Cohen shook their hands, invited them in, and sat them at his kitchen table. “Can I offer you anything to drink? My wife just made up a batch of iced tea before she left for her book club.”
Both men politely declined. “As I mentioned over the phone,” said Desh, “this has to do with an investigation we’re conducting. Unfortunately, I’m not at liberty to disclose the nature of the investigation. But I appreciate your cooperation.”
Cohen nodded. “Glad to help in any way I can.”
Desh had begun trying to learn who Eric Frey had become, what new Phoenix had arisen from the old psychopath’s ashes, right after his dinner with Kira a week before. He had immediately discovered that two weeks after Frey’s supposed suicide, the detective on the case had turned up dead. The papers quoted police sources who speculated his death was related to several murder cases he had been working on, but Desh knew better. The detective must have discovered evidence that Frey wasn’t as dead as he had been led to believe, and had paid for it with his life. Learning of this had only served to rub salt in Desh’s wound. If he had done even the smallest amount of follow-up, the situation would have been obvious, and Frey would have been removed from the board long ago.