Midway: Chapter 7

  I crossed a line today…

  I did something I knew was wrong.  I’ve always tried to be a good person, I’ve always wanted to be able to look in the mirror and be able to live with myself, but today… today I looked in the mirror and told myself to do something that I knew was wrong.  I told myself to put aside the part of me that knew what I was about to do was wrong and to do it anyway.  I gave myself permission to do something I knew was wrong… that must make me the worst kind of person.  

  I can’t even claim to not know what I was doing, I can’t even claim to have acted without thinking.  I knew exactly what I was doing.  I knew it was wrong.  I did it anyways…

  I crossed a line today…

   

  “We have a serious problem.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yes.  I tracked eye saccades, standard physiological measures, hell I even put them into the fMRI, and I turned up nothing.  So either it’s none of them, or it is one of them and somehow they can fool all of my tests, which… might be worse.”  It was two days later, and Johannes was dealing the bad news to Anaru in the makeshift interrogation room they’d constructed.  “None of them had credible alibis, but when I asked them about what they were doing that night none of them gave anything away or any indications that they were lying.”

  “Have you read the rest of the journal?” Anaru asked.

  Johannes blinked at him with some frustrated irritation.  “Well it’s forty nine years’ worth of detailed journal keeping, so no.   I haven’t had enough time.”

  “Right… well I’m still hoping something in it will give away who one of his victims were.   Any of them would be suspect number one after all…”

  “Absolutely… but dammit, I really thought something would come of these interviews though…”

  “Could somebody really have fooled the tests?” 

  “Well, the physiological tests are based on being able to detect the anxiety response related to the fear of being caught in a lie.  It measures pupil dilation, breathing and heart rates, skin conductivity… but when nothing turned up with those methods I called them all back one at a time to the biomedical lab and put them in the fMRI.  With that I could scan their brain and compare its activity against when someone is known to be telling the truth, and when they’re known to be lying.  The brain has to work hard in different areas.  As hard as it is to fool the biometrics it’s practically impossible to fool the MRI.”

  “What about the eye tracker you set up?”

  “Bupkis… In theory there are certain patterns of eye movements related to truth versus lie telling.   Sometimes looking up too frequently can reveal that someone is crafting an answer, while looking down can indicate just looking for an answer.  Any one of the methods maybe can be fooled, but they’re designed to work in tandem with each other, for one to catch the lie if the others fail to.”

  “So… what does this all mean for us?”

  “It means… that I have no idea where to go from here.”  Johannes put his hands on his hips in frustration and lowered his head to think.  “Ok, first we may have been too strict in who we though capable of manipulating the Brainchip logs, we have to consider that somebody may have taught themselves those skills unbeknownst to any of the rest of us.  I’ll work on casting a wider net and trying again.”  He rubbed his eyes and sighed.  “That’ll probably turn up some new names to talk to.  You know… a third possibility is that it really is one of those four men and somehow they can fool all of my tests.  If that’s the case, then this is all just a colossal waste of time.”  

  “How could anyone do that?” Anaru asked.

  “Well,” Johannes considered, half nodding to the side, “one way would be if their own brain actually has trouble telling the difference between lies and the truth.  I mean, if their brain thought the lie was the truth… but you’d think they’d have to be pretty far gone for that to be the case.”

  “Would I?”   Johannes was the brain guy, not Anaru.

  “Well, the fMRI works by being able to tell the difference between the brain remembering something and making up new information, which use different brain areas.   If the brain had already made up a false narrative and really believed it, that just might get by the MRI, but just the MRI.  Most of the other tests basically work by detecting anxiety, not guilt.   You’d essentially just have to not feel any guilt to beat them.   Or… again, have somehow tricked yourself into thinking that the false narrative was the truth.  I don’t see how that’s possible though,” Johannes concluded.

  “It’s a frightening proposition…” Anaru remarked reflectively.  “The idea that somebody could think their own lies were the truth?”

  “I know…”  The two stood in silence, considering their perceived lack of options.  “Well I’m not giving up Ana.  I’m gonna try a different approach.”  At that, he turned and left.

  Anaru shrugged, and simply pulled out his small pocket pad and sat down at the interrogation desk to do some work.