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turning to Dean with a huge grin on his face.
"Welcome to wonderland," he said, ushering Dean into the room.
"Hot pipe!" Dean whistled, all other words failing him at the sight with which
he was greeted.
The room ran the length of the building, and like the floor below was open
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plan.
Rich velvet drapes and hangings ran around the walls, blocking the windows and
giving the room an altogether richer, warmer feel. The floor space was
occupied by vast banks of comps, vids and other electronic pieces the use of
which was, at this moment, a mystery to Dean. In front of the drapes in one
corner stood a row of battered old metal filing cabinets, with an ornate
wooden writing desk to one side of them.
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"This," Danny said, encompassing the old tech with a gesture, "is the
hardware.
But that " he pointed with his Uzi to the filing cabinets. " is where the real
treasure lay, I'd say. I didn't pay it much attention back in the day, 'cause
I was only young. But now& that's a different matter. I'd say that those
drawers probably contain all the secrets to make this stuff viable again. And
that, my friend, is where we should be looking."
He strode across the room, pointedly ignoring the winking lights and gentle
hum of the comp consoles, and the flickering images that played again and
again on vid and terminal screens. Dean followed him, although he couldn't
help but be distracted by the old tech equipment, the likes of which had
always held a fascination for him. Some of it he recognized from redoubts, or
from the Brody school, where there had been a certain amount of old tech that
some of the teachers had tried to teach to the students, most of whom had more
pressing concerns. But, like his father, Dean had always had an interest. Ryan
had always been fascinated by the snippets of preDark culture that he could
find, almost as though he could somehow unravel the secrets of the past and
use them to make the present better for himself. Without anything ever being
said between them, Dean had always shared this interest, with a more practical
bent toward the old tech.
"Dean, come and take a look at this," Danny said softly. Dean stopped poring
over the console of a terminal, trying to get into the programming, and
hurried over to the writing desk, where Danny had a pile of books and papers
that he had taken from the filing cabinets, and which may or may not relate to
the electronics in the room.
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Dean looked over Danny's shoulder at the myriad of paper, covered with
figures, sentences that looked almost incomprehensible in their complexity,
and colorful drawings of the comps along with diagrams of their schematics.
"It's all here," Danny said, not without a note of awe in his voice, "but the
trouble is working out which bit belongs to which. I wasn't old enough then to
really get a grip on any of the theory, but it strikes me now that although
the boxes and circuits are working, it's the stuff that makes it all
work software, wasn't it? that's the problem. Sometimes, you can't immediately
tell what each comp has running it, and how to connect them to each other."
Dean nodded. "I know what you mean. The problem is that not all the software
recognizes each other, so you have to find ways of doing it. I was taught
something about that& networking, Mr. Brody called it. He had a few old comp
books."
"Did it work?" Danny looked at him with eyes glittering intently. The young
man had forgotten about the world of Charity and the Deathlands outside the
room, forgotten about their companions in the recce party, forgotten about any
dangers that may be facing them. All that mattered to him now was that he may
be close to cracking the secrets of the comps, and making them slaves rather
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than adversaries.
"Yeah, not that we had much in the way of equipment," Dean replied, catching
the mood. "Listen, if we can find a couple of cables, I could show you
quickly, and we could mebbe find out a little more about what Baron Al's got
here."
"Okay. What sort of cables do we need?" Danny asked, but Dean was already
rooting around the hardware, emerging with a couple of connecting cables.
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"These," he said. Then, indicating two of the comps, he added, "We'll take
those two. You connect that one." He pointed to the one nearest Danny.
"Sure," the youngster replied enthusiastically, taking the cable. "How do you
actually connect these things?"
"You look for the right socket on the back," Dean replied. "You put the male
lead into the female port."
"What?"
Dean smiled. "You never heard that? The triple stupes who invented these
things had male and female ends to them. The male is the one with prongs, and
the female "
"Is the one with the hole," Danny finished, shaking his head. "Shit, with
jokes like that, no wonder they tried to blow up the fucking world."
With the two comps connected, the young men hunched over them, each keeping an
eye on his terminal while Dean tapped in commands to try to identify the
software on each, and get them to communicate.
"This may not work," he said to Danny. "We really need more time for this. We
should wait until we get back to the redoubt," he continued, beginning to feel
the pressure of being stuck in enemy territory.
"Best to find out as much as possible now, and take as much of the paperwork,"
Danny said firmly.
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"Why?"
"Because& " Danny began, then stopped. He looked at Dean in a completely
different manner from any way he'd looked at him before, as though he were
assessing how much he could tell him. Finally, he decided. "Because I don't
trust
Papa Joe, that's why. See, he's spent so long with nothing to do except dwell
on revenge that I figure he'll go over the top when he gets his hands on Baron
Al. If it don't chill him, or everyone else, in the attempt, then he'll torch
the ville, and all this'll be lost. And this is the future. But he's spent so
long brooding over revenge that I reckon he may just be a little loco by now."
Dean nodded briefly. "I figure most of us feel the same. Trouble is, we've got
to go through with it because he outnumbers us& if you're with us on this."
Danny smiled. "Figure it's the other way around."
But the smile was driven from his face when a voice from behind them caused
them both to whirl round in shock.
"I figure it doesn't matter which way around you want it, 'cause neither of
you may get out of here alive especially if you get smart," the voice added as
Dean went for his Hi-Power.
He let his hand drop as their adversary, now stepping from behind one of the
drapes, showed herself. Danny cursed, That was always his hiding place, and he
should have figured on checking that one.
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