dotcom geek spy thriller
I'm on my way to my job when someone drops a bunch of stuff in an elevator and asks me to take it to the top floor. People getting in and out of the elevator look at the bulky random things strewn about with curiosity and annoyance. By what seems like the highest floor, everyone else has gotten off and two other folks (a man and a woman in their midtwenties, somewhat 80's movie geek chic; he's got dirty blond hair almost to his shoulders sort of in a ragged bowl cut, medium-rimmed glasses, and a rumpled overshirt unbuttoned over a white undershirt; she's just shy of wearing a lab coat.) get on and choose a higher floor still.
The elevator passes out of the building through the northern wall and rides along the wall in a very disquieting manner (lots of bouncing and swaying). It actually passes beyond the original building and reconnects to what seems like an adjunct building. The elevator halts outside of a large window and the two other passengers laugh not unkindly at my discomfort and usher me through (it's a slight jump across, and a good 15 to 20 stories down, enough to be somewhat dizzying when the contraption you're in doesn't really want to stabilize and rather seems like nothing's properly holding it up).
I jump into the large room and am ushered to the SE corner; there are all sorts of people bustling about talking quickly about all sorts of things that I'm not paying attention to. I'm handed a notebook and listen to a quick information exchange/argument between the guy and some other guy; I'm rather overwhelmed by the activity in the room and the fact that I was there to really pay attention. I'm handed off back to the girl, rather assigned to her, and told the title of her project. It's something physics-technical-sounding.
She's reading her paper to me to get me up-to-speed and I ask questions that aren't too stupid here and there, getting a feel for it. After a bit, she says her voice is getting raw, so I offer to read it, either just for myself or out loud if she really wants, and she hands me the paper (10 sheets of smallish journal print, bound with staples on the left (it's a proper bookletish thing)). I try to find where she left off, but the words swim a bit, and even when she points it out I lose it pretty quickly. However, stranger things take precedence--
Creatures are crawling around the lab. Small ones, at first, beetles and whatnot. Everyone else has left. Then some worms start acting up in a large (ten feet by ten feet by "seems to go through the floor, who knows how deep?") compost/terarrium thing in the center of the room; a sense of 'wrongness' invades. The worms are trying to crawl out... or something like that. We push them back in, but for every one we push in, a larger one comes back. It's really disquieting because we work our way up to TRYING to push back a worm that's nearly stronger than I am--five or six inches in diameter, who knows how long; its skin feels like a cross between a snake and a hotdog.
A helicopter passes by outside and lands on the roof; we see a larger-than life badger being hauled under it by net--the badger looks dead, but it's still time to leave. We escape back out the elevator and make it out of the building without incident; I'm then ushered to a long hallway which crosses a street and enters into a hotel on the other side.
In the hotel I'm told to find the new person I'm working for and told that he's gay, which seems like a very strong non-sequitur. I'm looking around quite lost when to guys on the stairs catch my eyes; I'm not sure why, so I keep looking around, but one of them (quite flaming) approaches me and asks if I'm looking for so-and-so. I say that I am, and they both say they're waiting for him and aren't really expecting him for another while or so, so I should just get comfortable in the back.
Heading to the back, I find myself in an odd train-like compartment: chairs/booths go on and on, divided into different cars. I try to find a spot far enough from people to try to get a handle on things, but wind up sharing a booth with someone else, and just trying to go to sleep; odd thoughts of hunger bother me and fade.
I'm (somewhat) rudely awoken by my bunkmate and someone else coming down the train who'd been looking for me. Apparently we're doing something, so I have to get ready. Getting ready involves making sure I have my motorcycle jacket on, and I drive (my motorcycle) to a city park, something like central park or golden gate park.
There, operatives are milling all about looking random and nondescript. One person is cracking a gate code to let us all through into a second park--I see a policewoman a hundred feet away, but she doesn't seem to notice us and I wonder if she's there just to add an air of "what we're doing must be allright because the cop isn't responding to it". A number of us random-walk through the gate before it closes behind, and I stride slowly but purposefully in the direction I entered the second park, hoping that I'm distraction _someone_ from _something_ (or vice versa), but really not sure what's going on. I feel a bit self-conscious, but I keep walking. When I get to the end of the enclosed second park (it ends in a building which I think may be part of the target), I turn right and begin to walk the circumference.
Before I'm back to the gate, the crowd seems to have broken up and it becomes more obvious that every person in the second/inner park was one of us, and now it's time to leave before that's obvious to everyone who possibly _should_ have been there. I walk for a different exit, something a bit confusing to me--it's a fence further away than the gate I came in and orthoganal to it, and it seems like there's an open exit, a place where the gate simply doesn't encompass the park any further, though I'm sure the place was entirely enclosed. Still, I'm also sure it will get me out, and in such a way as I don't have to retrace my path or look _more_ suspicious.
Out of the park, I find myself hooked up with two other fellows returning from the raid and we all take a quick dive into a large earthen ditch which has been lined with brown PVC sheeting, and its sides sealed. Cold (clean) water quickly fills it, and the two lounge back enjoying their trick, but it annoys me and I get out (walking on water? what sort of water is it, hmm?) and explain that while it's nice to spend time with them, perhaps, and I don't exactly _hate_ water, I'd rather go back and sleep, or eat something, than hang out cold, wet, tired, and hungry.
As I walk away, I wake up.
The elevator passes out of the building through the northern wall and rides along the wall in a very disquieting manner (lots of bouncing and swaying). It actually passes beyond the original building and reconnects to what seems like an adjunct building. The elevator halts outside of a large window and the two other passengers laugh not unkindly at my discomfort and usher me through (it's a slight jump across, and a good 15 to 20 stories down, enough to be somewhat dizzying when the contraption you're in doesn't really want to stabilize and rather seems like nothing's properly holding it up).
I jump into the large room and am ushered to the SE corner; there are all sorts of people bustling about talking quickly about all sorts of things that I'm not paying attention to. I'm handed a notebook and listen to a quick information exchange/argument between the guy and some other guy; I'm rather overwhelmed by the activity in the room and the fact that I was there to really pay attention. I'm handed off back to the girl, rather assigned to her, and told the title of her project. It's something physics-technical-sounding.
She's reading her paper to me to get me up-to-speed and I ask questions that aren't too stupid here and there, getting a feel for it. After a bit, she says her voice is getting raw, so I offer to read it, either just for myself or out loud if she really wants, and she hands me the paper (10 sheets of smallish journal print, bound with staples on the left (it's a proper bookletish thing)). I try to find where she left off, but the words swim a bit, and even when she points it out I lose it pretty quickly. However, stranger things take precedence--
Creatures are crawling around the lab. Small ones, at first, beetles and whatnot. Everyone else has left. Then some worms start acting up in a large (ten feet by ten feet by "seems to go through the floor, who knows how deep?") compost/terarrium thing in the center of the room; a sense of 'wrongness' invades. The worms are trying to crawl out... or something like that. We push them back in, but for every one we push in, a larger one comes back. It's really disquieting because we work our way up to TRYING to push back a worm that's nearly stronger than I am--five or six inches in diameter, who knows how long; its skin feels like a cross between a snake and a hotdog.
A helicopter passes by outside and lands on the roof; we see a larger-than life badger being hauled under it by net--the badger looks dead, but it's still time to leave. We escape back out the elevator and make it out of the building without incident; I'm then ushered to a long hallway which crosses a street and enters into a hotel on the other side.
In the hotel I'm told to find the new person I'm working for and told that he's gay, which seems like a very strong non-sequitur. I'm looking around quite lost when to guys on the stairs catch my eyes; I'm not sure why, so I keep looking around, but one of them (quite flaming) approaches me and asks if I'm looking for so-and-so. I say that I am, and they both say they're waiting for him and aren't really expecting him for another while or so, so I should just get comfortable in the back.
Heading to the back, I find myself in an odd train-like compartment: chairs/booths go on and on, divided into different cars. I try to find a spot far enough from people to try to get a handle on things, but wind up sharing a booth with someone else, and just trying to go to sleep; odd thoughts of hunger bother me and fade.
I'm (somewhat) rudely awoken by my bunkmate and someone else coming down the train who'd been looking for me. Apparently we're doing something, so I have to get ready. Getting ready involves making sure I have my motorcycle jacket on, and I drive (my motorcycle) to a city park, something like central park or golden gate park.
There, operatives are milling all about looking random and nondescript. One person is cracking a gate code to let us all through into a second park--I see a policewoman a hundred feet away, but she doesn't seem to notice us and I wonder if she's there just to add an air of "what we're doing must be allright because the cop isn't responding to it". A number of us random-walk through the gate before it closes behind, and I stride slowly but purposefully in the direction I entered the second park, hoping that I'm distraction _someone_ from _something_ (or vice versa), but really not sure what's going on. I feel a bit self-conscious, but I keep walking. When I get to the end of the enclosed second park (it ends in a building which I think may be part of the target), I turn right and begin to walk the circumference.
Before I'm back to the gate, the crowd seems to have broken up and it becomes more obvious that every person in the second/inner park was one of us, and now it's time to leave before that's obvious to everyone who possibly _should_ have been there. I walk for a different exit, something a bit confusing to me--it's a fence further away than the gate I came in and orthoganal to it, and it seems like there's an open exit, a place where the gate simply doesn't encompass the park any further, though I'm sure the place was entirely enclosed. Still, I'm also sure it will get me out, and in such a way as I don't have to retrace my path or look _more_ suspicious.
Out of the park, I find myself hooked up with two other fellows returning from the raid and we all take a quick dive into a large earthen ditch which has been lined with brown PVC sheeting, and its sides sealed. Cold (clean) water quickly fills it, and the two lounge back enjoying their trick, but it annoys me and I get out (walking on water? what sort of water is it, hmm?) and explain that while it's nice to spend time with them, perhaps, and I don't exactly _hate_ water, I'd rather go back and sleep, or eat something, than hang out cold, wet, tired, and hungry.
As I walk away, I wake up.