by D. B. Goodin
Simon looked surprised. “As far as I know, no business relationship exists between MuseFam and Omega.”
“You’re correct—there’s no business relationship, but there is a personal one. The CEO of Omega is Royce Bennett, who is Brenton Morris’s cousin.”
“Wow, I had no idea.”
“A talented forensic investigator does reconnaissance work on everything he investigates. I’ve investigated so many companies with grievances against MuseFam that the findings could fill an encyclopedia.”
A sound emanated from Simon’s computer, and after a quick glance, Simon said, “While we were talking, I ran several scans, and I can’t get any info on what’s behind the firewalls at that IP.”
“A conglomerate like MuseFam will not allow a casual glance behind their technology curtain without some work. I suggest that we recompile the code, with the same instruction set. When the visor calls home to upload the latest spy payload, we will have a little something special for them,” Nigel said.
Simon hesitated; his lips pressed together tightly. Nigel noticed that he seemed to be considering something but was conflicted. “I’m not sure if I should attempt any hack against my employer,” Simon said at last.
“I will make sure we’re clean. Let’s do this!” Nigel said.
“What’s your plan?”
Nigel gave Simon a small memory stick.
“Implant this code, then give me the visor. I need to walk the dog and collect some real-time data. Time to bait the trap,” Nigel said, smiling.
An hour later, Nigel was walking his friend Milo’s dog. He called the dog Poochie. Nigel didn’t remember the dog’s real name, but he often walked him, since an illness confined his friend to a wheelchair. Since Milo lived in the same building as Nigel, he didn’t need to go far to pick him up.
As Nigel began his walk, Simon communicated with him using an earpiece. He made sure that the microphone was disabled on the visor. He didn’t want to send MuseFam conversations of their hack.
“Hey, Uncle Nige, can you hear me?” Simon asked.
“Hear you fine, even over the noise of 11th Avenue.”
Nigel’s cameras recorded all activity in his entryway—including any conversations—for security reasons. He had upgraded the microphones for his security system and insulated his entryway to get better audio. His prior digital forensic work allowed him to gain the requisite knowledge to spot audio manipulation, and he also used these skills to make his own deepfakes when the need arose.
I’m glad I could gather enough audio for this experiment to work, Nigel thought.
Before heading out on the walk, Nigel had loaded the visor with modified samples of Alice’s voice.
I’m not invading the girl’s privacy, he told himself, just setting the trap.
Nigel played one of these altered audio files, and Alice’s voice resonated through the visor: “Now that I’ve lost those jerks, I can head over to the Purist HQ.” Nigel continued to walk toward 14th Street. After Poochie took care of business near the front entrance of the 14th Street park, Nigel noticed a black car stop just short of his location. He noticed two men in suits get out of the car; then the driver maneuvered the vehicle out of sight.
No one dresses this nice here, Nigel thought.
The two men spread out, and Nigel snuck a closer look at them as he threw Poochie’s doggie bag into the trash. Both men had visors on now; they seemed to be narrowing in on his location. Nigel started walking toward 15th Street. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw the men following close behind him. He stopped suddenly, then pivoted to face the men.
“Whoa, I almost hit you, pal, you shouldn’t follow that close. You’re likely to spook the dog,” Nigel said.
Getting no reaction from the men, Nigel walked past them. After a hundred feet, Nigel noticed the men were talking.
“What’s going on, Uncle Nige?” Simon asked.
“I can’t be sure, but I think I had a run-in with a couple of MuseFam goons. Were you able to determine the outbound location of the visor traffic?” Nigel said.
“It appears that network packets were sent to that MuseFam server in Trenton. Those goons showed just minutes after we sent the packets.”
“This can’t be a coincidence—let’s see what you get back from the servers,” Nigel said.
After getting out of sight from the two goons, Nigel shut off the visor, then took a longer walk back to his apartment.
Later that afternoon
After dropping off Poochie, Nigel returned to his basement lab.
Simon was standing in front of a large screen and appeared to be manipulating groupings of icons that represented data sets. For the casual observer, it looked like he was moving them around like puzzle pieces.
One good thing about visors is the ability to organize data sets using gestures, Nigel thought.
“Trying to find correlations?” Nigel asked.
“I’ve isolated the network traffic going to the MuseFam server. Besides the visor’s identification signature, GPS personal data was routed.”
“Did we get anything back from the MuseFam server?”
Simon smiled. “Yes—our Trojan horse could map the network. One more test should tell us how these men are being summoned.”
“Time for another walk then!”
Nigel took a driverless taxi to the Tribeca neighborhood of New York. Although the taxi didn’t have a human driver, the passenger could enable a virtual AI-based driver simulation.
“Hey, mon, where you going?” said the taxi AI.
“Chambers and Greenwich,” Nigel said.
“Buckle up, mon.”
As soon as Nigel engaged the safety belt, the taxi bolted toward 12th Avenue.
“Can you slow down?” Nigel said.
“What’s the fun in that, mon?” the AI said, laughing.
The back seat of the taxi was like any other that Nigel had seen in his life, except this one featured a large LCD screen that displayed an animated driver. His AI driver looked like a reggae musician; he had dreadlocks, a small hat, and a beard. A name tag appeared under the portrait. His AI driver was called Reggie.
“Hey, Reggie,” Nigel said.
“What’s that, mon?” Reggie responded.
“Let me out here,” Nigel said.
The taxi let Nigel out at Pier 26.
“Thanks for riding with Reggie, mon.”
The taxi sped away.
That was the strangest AutoTaxi ride I’ve ever taken, Nigel thought.
Nigel ordered a hot coffee from a local shop, then played the next Alice audio file: “Finally, I’m at the Purist base. Big meeting today.”
Nigel cringed at the words fake Alice was saying, but he hoped it would lure the goons. If the file was selected for additional processing, the implanted spyware would report the location of the server to Simon.
“Simon,” Nigel said, “do you have anything?”
“Nothing yet, but I saw the visor packets get transmitted to the MuseFam servers, but nothing received yet,” Simon replied.
“Let me know the minute you get something.”
Nigel had one more Alice audio file left. He only wanted to use it if he had to. After several more minutes of nothing, Nigel played the audio file as he walked down Chambers Street toward the Hudson. “It will be good to take down MuseFam,” Alice’s voice played. Several minutes later, Nigel was at a park that overlooked the Hudson.
“Did they take the bait this time?” Nigel said.
“Several marked packets are going to IP addresses at various destinations in the city. I should have a map soon.”
Nigel was about to head back to the street and call a taxi when he felt hands on his arm with enough pressure to hurt. Nigel turned; one of the goons grabbed his left arm. He was tall and wide and reminded Nigel of a thug. The man had a grin that gave Nigel chills.
“We know you’re screwing with us, old man,” the goon said.
Nigel saw the other goon quic
kly approaching from the other side of the walkway. There was a fair amount of people here today. Nigel decided to make a move.
“Hey, get off me!” Nigel yelled. “Help, this man is trying to rob me!”
Several people looked in his direction. The goon didn’t seem to be bothered by Nigel’s yelling; instead, his grip tightened. Nigel pulled away, and the other goon grabbed at him. Nigel slammed his head into the goon’s nose and heard a crunch. The goon’s grip eased on Nigel’s arm. As soon as his right hand was free, Nigel hit one of the goons in the throat. The other goon tried to grab his free arm.
“Are you okay, old man?”
Nigel looked toward the voice. A young man was approaching.
“This man is attacking me,” Nigel said.
The younger man tackled the goon that was holding Nigel’s arm. The other goon recovered enough to try to make another move on Nigel. When he got close enough, Nigel grabbed the small pepper spray canister that he kept in a compartment on his belt, then sprayed the goon directly in the eyes. The younger man had the other goon in a headlock.
“Are you okay, young man?” Nigel said.
The man nodded, then said, “I got this—go get some help.”
Time to leave, Nigel told himself. I don’t want to be questioned by the cops.
Nigel quickly headed in the direction of the West End Highway, leaving the goons.
“Uncle Nige, what’s happening?” Simon yelled into his earpiece.
“The goons grabbed me—they must have honed in on the GPS signal. They got the drop on me. A young man is fighting them now, can you send the cops?” Nigel said.
“I have your coordinates, I’m on it.”
“Thanks—I’m going offline for now.”
Nigel avoided any additional confrontations by taking two taxis and a few back alleys before reaching his apartment. The late afternoon sun was diminishing, but Nigel was able to take in a beautiful sunset from his front entryway before stepping inside.
A few minutes later, Nigel entered his basement lab, where Simon was still working away at the data.
“I hope you have something usable after what I went through,” Nigel said. “I’m worried about the girl, though.”
“What do you mean?”
“If the visor and her voice are being tracked, then she has been—or will be—a critical target soon. I’m afraid we may have made things worse for Alice. We should ask if she’s noticed anything suspicious—besides that Hawk fellow, I mean,” Nigel said. He had briefed Simon on Alice’s story as soon as they had started working on her visor.
“I did find a lot of random server metadata,” Simon said, “but nothing specific yet. It will take a while to analyze all that data.”
Nigel heard the doorbell. A quick check of the surveillance system revealed that Alice was at the door.
“The girl’s early,” Nigel said.
“I have what I need off the visor. I will get her.”
Nigel prepared the visor for a full system reset. He removed the cover, replaced the compromised chip, then started the system restoration.
3
Earlier that day
Alice arrived at her new place of employment, Roxy’s club, around three in the afternoon. As she entered from the back-alley entranceway, she could hear the music from an ongoing audition: the strumming of a bass and acoustic guitar, as well as a light and steady drumbeat. The sound was more subdued than the usual performances at the club. Then a low male tenor voice began singing about “walks on the dark side of life”—or that was what it sounded like to Alice.
From what I can hear, this band doesn’t totally suck, Alice thought.
Alice entered the stage area via a side entrance. Charlie, the club manager, was tugging on part of his handlebar mustache as he watched the band perform.
“There you are—been looking all over for you,” Charlie said in a pensive tone.
“Sorry—I got delayed. I had an appointment.”
“What manner of appointment was that?”
“A doctor’s appointment, of sorts.”
“I won’t ask what that means,” Charlie said.
The band onstage consisted of a group of men and women dressed in post-punk outfits that matched their wild hairstyles. They finished two more songs before Charlie called for a break. “Take ten, guys. The bar is to your left, help yourself.”
“Sorry again that I’m late,” said Alice, sensing Charlie’s annoyance. “I’ve been having the worst of luck.”
“If you ask me, you’re always in a heap of trouble, Alice.”
He seems to be asking a lot of questions about my free time, Alice thought.
“Life has been challenging.”
“We’ve only got a few minutes, so let me bring you up to speed,” Charlie said. “We have four auditions today, because Bobby and the Brawlers got snatched by the bloody Goth Queen. After their audition the other day, she poached them. We only have two live acts tonight, and I don’t want to hire Mr. Wash again,” Charlie said.
“Who’s that?”
“He’s a DJ that I hired the last time we didn’t have enough live entertainment.”
“That bad?”
“Not bad, but he can get the crowd into a frenzy. The last time he was here, two people went to the hospital. Some people reported falling ill after, so I think he might have added something to his smoke and lighting effects.”
“Smoke?” Alice said.
“It’s all part of his act—he uses smoke, strobe lights, and strange sound effects.”
“Well, he sounds like a showman,” Alice said.
“It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt,” Charlie sneered.
“How many auditions do you have lined up after this one?”
“One more. I’m inclined to reject these buffoons, but I’m afraid we won’t have enough entertainment to keep the crowds amused. Tonight is ladies’ night, our busiest night of the week.”
The band returned to the stage. Alice put her glasses on and readied her notepad. Her visor wasn’t available, of course, so it was time to take notes—by hand.
The band started with a guitar riff that sounded like someone scraped two pieces of metal together. Then the bass guitar joined in, and the lead guitarist changed to a more complex rhythm that sounded a lot better. Another band member started in with a trumpet. One of the women started singing a chorus that sounded like “do-woo-woo-you,” then two additional male band members with electric guitars joined in. The drums kicked into high gear, and then the song started. Alice couldn’t place the genre of the music; it was hard to describe. It was a combination of 1940s big band music and rock and roll from the 1970s. The rhythms of this last song changed depending on who was singing in the band. The sound was so exceptional that Alice nearly fell out of her seat.
Love the originality, Alice thought.
The band finished with another unique melody that started with the intense drumbeat, then some guitar strumming with a reduced but constant drumbeat. Alice thought the last song had no lyrics, but after several minutes the lead singer started singing about falling for a woman. Then she heard the sound that ruined the listening experience: an electronic synthesizer twanged.
“Wait!” Alice yelled at the band while waving her arms. They stopped playing.
“What is your problem?” the lead singer spat.
She sounds pissed, Alice noted, but since she violated house rules, she has no right to be.
“Show me what produced that electronic sound,” Alice said.
One of the band members showed Alice a small device the size of a boom box. Alice examined the device. There was a small sticker that was half torn off the device. She examined the words, which were faded but legible enough to read. Hot blood rushed through Alice’s face as she read the sticker:
* * *
MuseF— Mixer 5000.
* * *
“This audition is over,” Alice said.
“Why?” the lead sing
er demanded.
“This is an all-human club. It wouldn’t be fair to play some synthetic garbage produced by MuseFam, would it?”
The band members looked at each other, and then the lead singer said, “We are all human—we just use the device to give our band a unique sound.”
Alice thought for a moment.
“Okay, play the last song again without the garbage,” she said, pointing to the device.
The band did as she asked. The sound was about the same, and to compensate for the missing electronic sound, the drummer did a cool snare trick. Alice liked this sound well enough. The song ended with all instruments playing and singers performing in a perfect harmony, and then after a few more notes the melody finished and the band stopped suddenly.
“Hire them, Charlie,” Alice said, loud enough for all to hear. “But there’s one condition. The band agrees to not bring in anymore MuseFam garbage.”
“We can live with that,” the lead singer said.
Alice waited for the band to pack up and leave before asking Charlie something she had been thinking over. “What if I can convince the Goth Queen to lend us Bobby for the evening? It will give us some breathing room until we can fill the roster.”
Charlie nodded and said, “Sure. Go after the next audition.”
After leaving Roxy’s, Alice walked into an old, dilapidated building in the Alphabet City area of Manhattan. Two men dressed in suits at least a hundred years out of date blocked the entrance.
“You got business here?” one of the men asked, blocking the staircase.
“Is this where the Goth Queen’s club is?”
The man smiled at Alice: a gruesome sight, because he was missing several teeth, combined with his pasty pale complexion and pencil-thin mustache.
This guy creeps me out!
The other man looked like a mime; his face was painted white, and he even had a hat that looked like something a mime would wear. But he wasn’t a mime.