Catalyst (Breakthrough Book 3) (4 page)

“Right.”

“Well, that’s where it’s not making sense,” Lee shrugged, looking at Juan.  “IMIS is now picking up on nonverbal cues –– we’ve already established that.  We’re not exactly sure on how that’s happening.  But the more obvious problem is that while IMIS is picking up on those nonverbal cues, it has no way to
convey
them.”

“That we can see,” corrected Juan.

Chris squinted.  “I’m not sure I’m following.”

Lee thought for a moment.  “Let’s say, for example, that a nonverbal cue IMIS picks up from Dulce is a shrug.  It sees that from the video feed and matches it with the audio.  But how does it convey that?”

Now Chris understood.  “I see.  So while IMIS can
observe
a shrug, it has no way to actually transmit that gesture through the vest’s speaker.”

“Bingo!”

“Wow.  That
is
weird.”

“It shouldn’t be able to translate gestures in both directions, but it does.  And we don’t know how.”

Chris thought it over.  He didn’t know the answer either.  He had a suspicion but nothing concrete.  It was a topic that Alison and he had discussed several times over the last couple years and were sure others had too.  After years in the field, working with different creatures, they had eventually come to the same conclusion: there was something deeper and unknown happening when it came to communication.  Especially in less cognizant brains.  It was something many people had wondered about at one time or another.  How animals knew so much instinctively, even things they had never been taught by a parent.  

Communication was the means to knowledge.  But Chris and Alison, as well as other researchers, even veterinarians, were sure there was something else happening at a deeper level.  A level that humans could not yet understand or measure.

But maybe IMIS was doing just that.

4

Tiago Otero raised his head upon hearing a soft knock on the door.  A moment later it was slowly pushed open and one of Otero’s assistants apologetically poked his head inside, interrupting the discussion.

Otero displayed a pained expression and apologized to the man across the small table.  With dark eyes topped by a head of stark white hair, the other man appeared older than Otero.  He was dressed in the familiar dark green and brown fatigues of the Brazilian Army.  Silently, he watched as Otero rose from his leather chair and followed the assistant out.

They stood in the hallway, waiting for the door to click shut.  When it did, Otero’s eyes became cold.

“What is it?”

“I’m very sorry to interrupt,” whispered the younger man.  “But you wanted me to alert you if there was a problem.”

Otero looked at him expectantly.

“Lieutenant Russo has lost contact with his men.”

Otero’s expression barely changed.  He stared intently, twisting his lips in a manner that made his assistant nervous.  Otero’s unpredictability was well-known, and his wrath legendary.  It was a look his assistant had seen many times and hoped would never be directed at him.  He was emphatically hoping that now. 

Otero had no friends.  Only enemies and fearful acquaintances.  Which is how he preferred it.  Everyone nervous and afraid.  Fear was the ultimate motivator.  It stripped the strong of their confidence and made the meek obey.  Otero scoffed at those who claimed power was about money.  True power was about
fear
.  Power through money was for the weak.  Power through fear was for rulers.

“Why didn’t he tell me himself?”

“H-he’s still trying to reach them, sir.”

Otero stared at him, thinking.  The men his assistant referred to were the men Russo had sent to Florianópolis.  It was a simple job.  Easy for men of their skill.

Miguel Blanco had given him the information he sought in São Paulo.  Much more than he already knew.  But Blanco had already talked to too many people.  He had to be silenced.

More importantly Blanco had killed one of Otero’s partners.  Alves was a competitor –– a ruthless one –– but he was still part of the group.  The echelon.  A fellow oligarch who shared in the control of Brazil and most of South America.  A man with far more wealth than most would ever know, and with it, certain protections. 

Otero had warned the man that Blanco, his head of security, could not be trusted.  He wouldn’t listen.  Instead, he trusted the young assistant he was sleeping with far too much.  A common mistake of old, desperate men, clinging to the last remnants of their virility.  It left him open, vulnerable.  And Blanco pounced. 

Alves was foolish.  But Blanco was still a dead man the moment he killed his boss.  Now Blanco and his entire family would be made an example of, just like so many before him.  Alves was shrewd.  But Otero was unforgiving.

And then there was Alves’ secret.  He’d gotten close, within grasp of perhaps the greatest discovery of mankind.  Too close, in fact.  In the end, his eagerness had compromised his objectivity.  No, not eagerness.  The man was desperate
.
  Desperate for it to be true.  Desperate for it to be real.  And when he found out it was everything he’d hoped for, the desperation had blinded him.  It was a mistake Otero would not repeat.

Florianópolis was one of the most desirable places to live in all of Brazil.  Located just over four hundred miles south of São Paulo, the large island of Florianópolis was the Brazilian capital city and held the title for having one of the highest living standards in the country.  With its local population composed mostly of Brazilian and European descent, the lighter subtropical weather made it one of the most sought after cities in which to reside.  Assuming one had the resources, or perhaps had
acquired
the necessary resources.

Steve Caesare examined the two bodies lying face down.  Both were bound, but only one was still breathing.  The other was dead.  It wasn’t Caesare’s fault.  The idiot wouldn’t stop.  He wouldn’t give up until Caesare had no choice. 

He stepped back and leaned against the wall.  If he thought his side hurt before, it was practically screaming after having to drag them both from the front room. 

The large closet they were now in wouldn’t keep them from being found.  It would only delay it.  And of course, the one would survive and eventually make it back to Otero.  He hoped by then Blanco’s family would have heeded his warning and fled the country.  He had a feeling the man named Otero wasn’t going to take this well.

Miguel Blanco had been a bastard.   A murderer with little conscience and even less remorse.  Caesare knew that and wouldn’t lose sleep over him being dead.  But in his experience, the families were usually innocent and largely unaware of their father’s or husband’s work when he was away from them.  The family didn’t deserve it.  And Blanco’s family didn’t deserve to be used as Otero’s calling card.

Fortunately, Caesare had the advantage.  At least this time.  The thugs had shown up expecting to find Blanco’s wife and children unsuspecting and defenseless.  Instead they found Steve Caesare.  The timing was lucky but he was sure Otero would eventually find out who he was.  While Caesare caught his breath, his lips curled into a wry grin and he decided to leave the man a message. 

He walked forward and pulled up the dead man’s pant leg, revealing a Fallkniven A1 survival knife strapped securely to his calf.  Caesare unclipped the weapon and slid it out, momentarily admiring it.  He then reached down and cut a shape into the back of the man’s brightly colored shirt.  At least they had the sense to dress the part.

If Otero were stupid enough to pursue Caesare, he should at least know who he was dealing with. 

He returned the knife and nodded approvingly.  The shape was a trident, the symbol of the U.S. Navy’s Sea, Air, and Land teams –– more commonly known as SEALs. 

5

DeeAnn Draper’s office was small and conservatively decorated.  Just a single framed picture on the beige wall and another on her desk were all she had ever bothered to put up.  It was a reflection of both her minimalistic lifestyle as well as the limited amount of time she actually spent in her office.  Chris joked that it eerily resembled an advertisement out of an office supply magazine.  But she did really like it there.  She felt as much at home with Alison’s team as she had working at the Gorilla Foundation.  And what Alison and her team had achieved was simply amazing.

DeeAnn sat in her black chair and scanned the room, now wishing she’d made a little more of an effort to decorate.  But then again, maybe this would make things easier.

She glanced up at the sound of a soft knock on the door.

“Come in.”

The door opened just far enough to allow Lee Kenwood’s young and somewhat handsome face to peek in.

“Oh good, you’re still here.  I saw your light on and thought I’d check.”

DeeAnn grinned.  “Yep.  Still here.  Unfortunately.”

“You got a sec?”

“Sure.”

With that, Lee pushed the door open and stepped inside.  He was holding the latest vest he and Juan had just built.  “Good news, the new vest is ready.”

DeeAnn stood up, grabbing one side of it.  “Lee!  You’re not supposed to be lifting anything heavy.”

“It’s okay,” he shrugged.  “They’re feeling a lot better.”

DeeAnn gave him a dubious frown.  “Ribs don’t heal that fast.”  Together they sat it down onto the other half of her desk.  She ran her fingers over the dark nylon and the two large Velcro pockets that wrapped around the waist.  “I’m sorry I broke the last one.”

“It wasn’t your fault.  Besides, it gave us a chance to tweak a few things.”

“Like what?”

“Nothing major.  Just some slight improvements.  More padding around the motherboard.”  He tapped a portion lightly to show her.  “And we also removed some of the material on the back, which should improve the airflow a little.”

“Music to my ears.”  DeeAnn stood the contraption on end and turned it around.  The vest was amazing technologically, but from a non-geek standpoint it was a burden to wear in hot weather.  The humidity in Puerto Rico was already more than she was used to, but it had been almost suffocating in Brazil.  “It feels lighter,” she observed.

“The old one had heavier batteries.”

The original vest had been a big step forward.  Being allowed to remain in the habitat and still have it transmit back and forth to IMIS was huge.  But when Lee and Juan made better versions and included a camera, it was a game changer.

“Thank you, Lee.  I really appreciate it.”

DeeAnn laid the vest back down and noticed he hadn’t said anything.  She looked back up to find him silently staring down at the vest. 

“Something on your mind?”

After a moment, he looked back at her.  “Do you have time to talk about something?”

She folded her arms in front of herself.  “Of course.  Is this about that problem with the logs?”

Lee nodded.  “We were talking to Chris about it earlier today and I had a thought.  Something I wanted to ask you about.”

“Okay.”

“So, we’ve talked about the whole communication problem with the speaker.”

“The nonverbal problem.”

“Right.  The system doesn’t have the ability to translate nonverbal communication back through the speaker.  At least it shouldn’t.  So instead of trying to troubleshoot that, it occurred to me that maybe there’s a different answer.  Something that we’re not considering.”

“Like what?”

“Well, initially I thought the log problem existed because IMIS wasn’t translating correctly.  I’m a believer in the fallibility of computers, so I assumed it was a fault somewhere.  But it
was
translating correctly, and it took me a long time to understand it.”  He blinked, thinking as he spoke.  “What I’m wondering now is whether I’ve made the wrong assumption again.”

“About the speaker?”

“Yes.  I’ve been trying to figure out what happens to the nonverbal cues when they reach the speaker.  The one thing I’ve learned is that language is really kind of…intangible.  And today it suddenly hit me.  What if I’m looking for the wrong thing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, assuming this is all still measurable somehow, it would mean that we’re missing something.  Maybe our idea of nonverbal is not correct.  Maybe incomplete.”  Lee took a breath.  “What if IMIS isn’t missing anything…and we are?”

DeeAnn peered at him curiously.  “I get the impression you have a question coming.”

“Yes, I do.” He grinned again.  “You said yourself that primates, particularly gorillas, are very nonverbal communicators.  But to us that usually means physical movement of some kind.  But what if we’re wrong?  What if the nonverbal stuff only explains part of the missing exchange?  What if there is still more
verbal
communication taking place that we’re not hearing?”

DeeAnn was fascinated.  She remained still, staring at him over the desk.  “You’re talking about frequencies.”

Lee nodded.

“So, you want to know if gorillas can hear frequencies that we can’t.”

“Correct.”

“Something tells me you’ve already done some research.”

“A little.”

DeeAnn smiled broadly.  She was really going to miss these talks with Lee. “Then you probably know the jury is still out.  A lot of the older research suggests that gorillas and humans share the same audio frequencies  But after the gorilla genome was successfully mapped, it revealed differences in the genes tied to hearing, and therefore to communication.”

“So the answer is yes?”

She shook her head.  “Not necessarily.  But it’s widely accepted that humans and gorillas have very different aural environments…so the answer isn’t no, but it also isn’t yes.”

“So nobody knows.”

“Nobody knows.”

“So then…what is your
opinion
?”

“My opinion?”  She frowned, considering the question.  “Is it possible they can hear things we can’t?  Of course.  A lot of animals can do that. 
Are
gorillas doing it?  I don’t know.  Maybe.”

“It could explain a lot.  Like how IMIS is able to communicate so well with Dulce through just a speaker.”

DeeAnn glanced down at the vest, her arms still folded in front of her.  “Well, there’s only one way to find out.”

The programming took almost eleven hours to write and test, leaving Lee precious few hours to rest.  It didn’t matter. He was too excited to sleep.  IMIS was hiding a secret and he was determined to find out what it was.

The problem was that IMIS wasn’t programmed to process communication beyond the frequencies of human hearing.  However, IMIS
was
programmed to learn artificially; so if it was processing other frequencies, it was doing so by a mandate other than the one laid out in the original computer code.

This also meant that all of the analytical tools were set between twenty hertz to twenty thousand hertz, the range of human hearing.  The dolphin language was similar, except at a very high end where their echolocation was used.  What Lee had spent the night programming was a new instruction set for IMIS, instructing it to include a wider range of speech frequencies in its analytics.  If there was something there, IMIS was now instructed to show it.

DeeAnn was back early in the morning, at a little past six a.m.  She returned with two tall cups of coffee and a bag of donuts, which she wouldn’t touch but Lee loved.

He thanked her and bit into one.  “I think we should be ready soon.”

“Good.  Dulce should be up pretty soon.”  She lowered the cardboard carrier down next to Lee and withdrew one of the cups.  Behind them, Juan burst into the room, causing DeeAnn to jump and nearly spill her coffee.

“What did I miss?!”

“Geez, Juan!”  DeeAnn checked her shirt for any dark spots.  “Some of us are a little on edge here!”

“Sorry.”

Lee grinned behind his own cup.  He set it down and returned to his keyboard.  “Not too much yet.  I’m still compiling.  Did you bring it?”

“Yep.”  Juan reached into his pants pocket and retrieved a long silver tube.

“What is that?”

“A dog whistle.”

“A dog whistle?”

Juan grinned.  “It’s my little sister’s, but it should work.”

“We need to verify this first before we do any tests with Dulce.”  Lee raised the lid on his laptop and opened another audio program.  It looked different, but DeeAnn recognized the familiar meter running from left to right.  After waiting for the program to initialize, Lee spoke into the small microphone located just above his laptop keyboard.  “Testing, testing.”

A yellow line danced up and down as it moved across the screen, showing the waves picked up through the microphone.  “Okay, here’s my voice.  You can see the ranges here, including inflection and volume.  We can also see the wider frequency range here, which is between one thousand and five thousand hertz.  Give or take.  This is the range where human speech is centered.”  Lee backed up his chair.  “Ready, Juan?”

“Yep.”

Lee restarted the recording again and moved out of the way to allow Juan to lean in closer.  He blew through the dog whistle, making a quiet hissing sound.  This time, the sound waves on the graph jumped dramatically.  The peaks and valleys were sharper and traveled well beyond the frequency ranges that Lee had pointed out.  Both the top and bottom areas outside the human ranges displayed colors of yellow, orange, and red, showing the progression
away
from the narrower human range.

“Wow.  Big difference.”

“And this is what you think IMIS is picking up?”

“Maybe,” Lee shrugged.  “But even if we find it’s picking up a fraction of the extra frequencies, it could be significant.”

“So, now what?”

“Now we need to wait for the compiling to finish.  This was just a simple test through my laptop.  When the code is done, we’ll need to upgrade the monitoring software on IMIS.  Then we give it a whirl.”

DeeAnn smiled excitedly.  She grabbed the new vest and slung it over her shoulder.  “I’ll go get breakfast.”

Breakfast was a four-pound box of celery, kale, and apples.  Dulce had developed a real affinity for apples.  DeeAnn suspected the higher sugar content made apples taste like a
dessert
to the young gorilla.   In fact, she had become so excited, they were the first thing she searched for in the box of food.  And this morning was no different.

Once DeeAnn was inside the habitat, the three-year-old gorilla came running across a small grassy hill at which point she stopped and hugged the top of DeeAnn’s legs.

Apples apples.

DeeAnn smiled, setting the box down with a thud and standing up.  She watched as Dulce reached in with her lanky brown arms and brought out two apples, one in each hand.  She smiled broadly at DeeAnn with a toothy grin. 

“Dessert is last.”

Dulce stopped with a frown before placing them back into the box and picking up a stalk of celery. 

The Puerto Rican mornings were gorgeous.  With temperatures routinely in the high sixties and low seventies, the air felt cool and refreshing, offsetting the island’s high humidity.  But the best part was the smell.  Tropical islands had an unmistakable smell of dew in the morning, brought on by overnight moisture on the lush foliage.  With the lightest of breezes, the combination made the mornings smell like dewy sweetness –– it was a smell DeeAnn was going to miss.

Of course, sweetness had another presence in DeeAnn’s mornings which made Dulce’s name so fitting.  She was the most loving, kind creature DeeAnn had ever known, and certainly that she had ever worked with.  She had saved the gorilla at a young age from a horrible existence in Mexico, and they had been inseparable ever since.

Me love mommy.

DeeAnn grinned and playfully ruffled the fur on the back of her neck.  “Mommy loves Dulce.”

She barely noticed anymore as the vest picked up her words, and in less than a second, sent the data to IMIS and back where the large speaker emanated a series of squeals and soft grunts for Dulce.

DeeAnn watched Dulce quickly devour her breakfast, yet when she reached the apples, she purposely slowed down as if savoring them.  A sweet tooth seemed just as popular in gorillas as they were in humans.  DeeAnn was dreading the day Dulce discovered chocolate.

She sat back and continued watching Dulce, then turned and looked up at one of the high-resolution cameras overhead, surrounding the habitat.  She wondered if IMIS was revealing anything interesting to Lee and Juan upstairs.