denial didn't happen.”
From behind the front desk a female clerk called, “Next please.”
Oyster walked to the machine by the front desk. A mechanical arm lowered and pressed against his neck. The machine buzzed and Oyster tensed. Another arm came down and dabbed his neck with a piece of cotton.
“Next please,” the clerk called again. Ginger took Oyster’s place and the same procedure was repeated.
Ginger joined his friend and as they passed Rachel heard him say, “Goldberg was cruel and unjust. This Grimmleif should restore some vigour to society!”
What? Had he really just said that? Had he really just changed his mind so quickly? One moment he hated Grimmleif then seconds after getting a new wallet he thought he was righteous.
“Next please.”
Rachel covered her face with her hair. “Huh?”
“Young lady… You're next,” repeated the clerk.
Rachel bit at her nails. She rubbed her neck and looked around. A woman behind her tapped and pointed forward. “They’re calling you, it’s your turn.”
Rachel walked out of the queue, out of the bank and back into the crowded streets.
----- X -----
Rachel knocked on the door; a short man with a blonde ponytail opened it. “Ah! Rachel, come in!” The room was wall to wall electronics; circuit boards, aerials and wires. There were clothes on the floor and dirty dishes piled up by the sink. In short, it was chaos.
“Prism, I need a favour.”
“What is it?”
Rachel bit her lip. “I need food.”
“Oh yeah, sure, you can help yourself. But, how come you need to ask me?”
“My wallet chip fried last night. It burned up, literally. Sebastian had to cut it out of my neck because it was burning me.”
“Really? You need to go to the bank. Get it replaced.”
“I went there,” Rachel began. “But I saw some chefs from the diner. They were in the queue in front of me and I heard them talking about dead president, Goldberg.”
“Bad things I imagine?”
“No, actually. They spoke good things about him… but then they got their new chips and started talking differently about him, as if he was bad. It was instant. They said Goldberg was a good guy; they got new chips, and then started talking about him being bad… There were a lot of people in the bank whose chips had stopped working. I think there’s a problem with the wallets… Anyway… I didn’t get a new chip.”
Prism scratched his chin. “Do you still have the fried chip?” Rachel nodded. “Give it here; let me take a look... Oh, and if you still want food, I got pizza leftovers in the fridge.”
“Of course I want food.” Rachel opened her purse and found the thumbnail sized chip. In the fridge she found the half eaten pizza still in the cardboard box.
Prism hammered away at his keyboard; lines of code appeared in a digital terminal in response to his strokes. Prism took the chip and logged into the biometric-wallet network. He was greeted by a screen which was all written in encrypted code. His eyes narrowed as he stared at the code, this wasn't the normal response one would usually get from attempting to log into the network database. He reached down and plugged a memory stick into his computer tower, containing decryption software that he had made himself. The software hadn't been able to decrypt the code; Prism swore. He tried one more time, this time attempting Rachel's chip login at the same time. Instantly, the series of numbers disappeared and the words ‘access granted’ illuminated on his monitor. “Oh, my God!” Prism's eyes widened.
“What?” asked Rachel.
“Your chip ID has root privileges.” Prism’s mouth was wide open. “I'll transfer your chip data onto my computer. I'll take a look at all of it. I'll need to check out the wallet system first.”
Prism handed the chip back to Rachel.
“Thanks, Prism.”
----- X -----
Rachel walked down an alleyway to cut past all of the crowds. A vagrant pushing a cart with a small TV inside stopped in front of Rachel in a doorway. The TV screen was fuzzy but the image was clear enough. General Grimmleif was being sworn in as president. People were throwing flowers at him, cheering hysterically. Why? Why did the people like him so much? Why was he suddenly president, after Goldberg’s death, merely twenty four or so hours ago?
“Bah, humbug!” spat the vagrant. “He overthrew Goldberg, how can these idiots not see that? How can they accept a murderous traitor as their president; it is something that is beyond ludicrous!”
----- X -----
Prism sat in the light of three monitors. Lines of code upon code scrolled on the screen. He slouched over his keyboard and stared at the data. Another monitor beside him was consistently opening up new windows of documents and folders. IP scans were operating on the third screen.
He scratched his chin and looked at a folder titled ‘Noir-v-2.0’
“Hm. What’s this?” Prism said to himself. He clicked on the folder. Several thousand files were neatly organised, all which included the file extensions ‘.gov’ or ‘.unf’.
“Government files and United Nation of Freedom files... Really, what is this?” He clicked on a file that would normally require a password. His eyes widened... No “access denied” pop ups, or anything forbidding him entry. The password security was bypassed. He could view the file, although it contained nothing interesting, he could view it! Prism smiled, and decided to open some more, all them opened without any problems. Excitedly, he continued his spree.
Suddenly, he froze, looking at a document on his screen; his eyes were wide and his mouth agape. “Oh, my God!”
----- X -----
Back and forth the pen rolled on the desk, rattling every time it hit Smith’s finger. He flicked the pen again.
Large digital screens were lined along the walls; long desks skirted the room where dozens of workers monitored computer terminals. They were buried in their computer screens. Technological chatter buzzed and beeped and workers discussed programming related topics and security engineering.
A bold line of text flashed on the computer screen in front of Smith. “Commander Ohlin, something you should see.”
Ohlin was shift commander of the Cyber Command Unit. Grimmleif had put him in charge personally to make sure things ran smoothly over the crucial first twenty four hours. So far it was going without a hitch. He went down and stood over Smith’s shoulder. “What is it?”
“It looks like a sniff in the government database. It's real deep into the documents, but it never triggered any alarms on entry.” Smith pointed a finger to a line of text on his monitor, “It's an outside connection, but somehow it has root privileges… that can’t be right. I thought you could only get root access from a wired connection within the building?”
Ohlin looked at the screen and rubbed his jaw. “Trace the connection. It may be nothing but let’s not leave it to chance.”
“Yes, sir!”
The screen lit up with a map of the city as seen through the hub and spokes of its network connections. The screen zoomed in and enhanced on one district. “It’s coming from the lower districts. Nobody down there should have access.” The commander looked at the location as Smith cross referenced the address with a citizen file. “There’s a guy called Prism Asterixson at that address… Ha.” He pointed to the screen. “Three convictions for unlawful computer intrusion.”
“Got him.” Ohlin whispered. He patted Smith on the shoulder and took his telephone and called Captain Espedal of the Black-Coats, the elite police force.
----- X -----
Large men stormed into a munitions room dressed in black combat gear with hard padding on the shoulders and elbows. They grabbed their weapons and jogged into the courtyard. They carried assault rifles and wore the long black coats of their namesake. They stood to attention as a man with a brown ponytail walked ahead of them.
“New instructions from the CCU,” he called out to the men. “As you know… with the
death of President Goldberg there are some trouble makers looking to exploit the situation. Cyber Command are tracking hackers looking to get into government systems. They think they can do what they like, imagining our hands are tied elsewhere keeping order. Tonight, we’re going to show them they’re wrong. Black-Coats are always ready. Yes?
“Sir, yes, Sir!”
“Load up!”
One after the other, they piled into the backs of black armoured vans.
----- X -----
Ohlin stood over Smith, looking at the monitor. The screen to his side had a photograph of Prism and his criminal record. “Can you get access to the kid’s computer? I’d like to see what he’s accessing and how.”
Smith typed in some commands into his terminal. A window opened to display a log of viewed documents and files under the heading ‘Prism-Desktop’.
Ohlin leaned closer. “Let’s have a look.” He saw that Prism had accessed financial files and medical database notes, nothing of much interest to him. Further down the list, Prism had turned to military documents and munition reports. And finally files within the ‘NOIR-V-2.0’ directory. Ohlin’s eyes widened. He reached for the telephone. “General Grimmleif, we’re monitoring a computer hacker and it appears he’s accessed the wallet exploit.”
“Explain the details to me,” replied the general.
Ohlin cleared his throat. “Well, at first we received notification that there had been an intrusion in our intranet; I thought nothing of it at first.
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