“From Dallas? That’s a long cab ride.”
Griffin ignored this. “Take me to the airport.”
“You got it, boss.”
When the cab picked up speed the breeze through the open window lessened the reek of vomit to a point approaching bearable. His shoes made wet squidgy noises in the soggy cardboard.
According to the textbook, Griffin should confront the suspect and see if he can shake anything loose. Apparently most people gave away a surprising amount of information when confronted by authority and the threat of prison. The majority of the population weren’t cut out for a life of crime. Most were too stupid to do it well, and the rest too honest.
Griffin couldn’t imagine himself as ‘authority’ or being able to pull off anything even remotely confrontational. Lokner was a man famed for his genius and savvy, who regularly wrangled multi-billion Au deals without breaking a sweat or showing signs of stress. He would not be intimidated by a kid fresh out of college or his shiny new NATU badge. Chances were, few if any in M-Sof would know Lokner was still alive, living in the basement so to speak. Still, Griffin could think of no other way to proceed. First he had to figure out who would know Lokner was there. The answer was easy: M-Sof’s head Systems Administrator would have to know about Lokner. Griffin called up company records on his palm-comp. It took three minutes for the information to download. Having had infinite information at his fingertips in an instant his entire life, this felt like an eternity. Maybe two eternities. This was the kind of lag time his Dad bitched about when discussing the old days.
The data finally displayed as Griffin was about to give up and cancel the request.
“Shit.”
Miles Pert, hired before he finished school for a stunning yearly income that left Griffin questioning his own choices, left the company the day of Lokner’s death. He wasn’t alone. Quite a few people fled M-Sof fearing that with Lokner gone the company would lose direction and flounder.
A dead end.
The new Senior Sys Admin was hired two days after Lokner’s death and Griffin figured the chances she knew anything were minimal.
Griffin saw no choice. He had to fly to Redmond.
He tried to stretch out his legs to straighten the complaining knee but the back seat was too cramped. A waft of his own body odor made it over the bouquet of sun-warmed puke. The thought of another flight and another hotel drained his resolve. He wanted to give up and go home, slink back to his quiet desk job—assuming he still had one—and leave all this behind. Someone else could do this. Someone heroic. Someone who didn’t feel like he’d already been dead for three days.
But if he gave in now, Nadia died for nothing. All those children the crèches had killed over the years went unavenged, and Lokner remained unpunished.
Under all that lurked the question: What kind of man was Griffin Dickinson? Was he even a man? Most days he still felt like a high-school kid. It felt like he’d never done anything that defined him. Did he turn away when he saw evil being perpetrated? Again he thought back to his father explaining how his chief regrets were of the things he had not done. Was this what the old man was talking about? Sometimes his father only made sense in hindsight.
I won’t walk away. If he did, he’d regret it the rest of his life. Desperate and perhaps more than a little foolish, but the only way to bring some semblance of meaning to these deaths was to bring down those responsible. Lokner was the next step. It might go beyond Lokner, but until Griffin questioned him he couldn’t know for sure. Griffin placed a call on his palm-comp. Since it was local, the connection remained decent. He even got a choppy video feed.
“You look like stomped shit,” said Abdul. “Still.”
“Thanks. I need your help.”
There was a long pause and Abdul was so still Griffin couldn’t tell if the connection had frozen or if the chassis just wasn’t moving. “I’ve been pulled off active duty. Psyche-evaluation.”
“Screw that.”
“I might be unstable.”
Unstable? Griffin considered his own mental state, his need to move. His desire to punish, to do violence. “Join the club. Pack your bags we’re going to Redmond, Washington.”
“Exactly what kind of bags do you think a walking battle tank needs?”
“Turtle Wax and a shammy cloth? A change of oil.”
“Oh, I see. You’re funny today. So what’s in Redmond?”
“M-Sof and Mark Lokner.”
“I take it you aren’t one for keeping up with the news.”
Griffin groaned. “I didn’t go to bed last night. I’ve been in the office all day trying to crack this case. What news?”
“M-Sof is gone, my man. Some paramilitary unit blew it to dust and debris last night. A few dozen biological fatalities and a couple of chassis were destroyed along with their Scans. M-Sof’s on-site data systems are nothing but a memory.”
“You’re shitting me.”
“Dead serious. Dead and serious.”
“Was this corporate warfare, terrorism, or some governmental black op?”
“No idea. No one has claimed responsibility. It’s gotta be corporate.”
The video feed went choppy again and Griffin considered the timing of the attack wiping out the world’s satellites and the attack on M-Sof. Coincidence? Could Lokner somehow be behind all of this? No, they had to be unrelated. “Yeah, seems likely. The timing, though....” Griffin paused, lost in thought. “Pack your toothbrush. We’re leaving on the next flight. I’ll send a dump truck to pick you up.”
“You’re too funny.”
***
After waking to the news that someone—and every mad little terrorist group and activist organization claimed responsibility—attacked and destroyed world’s satellites in the last twenty-four hours, Miles went to work. This might be a good time to update my resume and look for work in a field not involving the movement of information. Unfortunately he didn’t have any other skills.
Entering the brass and marble lobby of 5THSUN, he dreaded what he’d find upstairs. The reality was worse than expected.
Miles sat staring at his desk, a long list of error and infiltration messages scrolling before his eyes. This isn’t possible. Even with the loss of every single communications satellite, for any of this to make sense, M-Sof would have to be gone.
“News. M-Sof,” he told the desk.
He knew a moment of annoyance as he waited for the upload and then smacked himself when he remembered the satellites. Remembering his Computer History classes, he considered the strain now being put on the old information systems. His best guess was that if ‘someone’ didn’t do ‘something’ soon, the internet would collapse completely, a victim to overload and cascading clock drift, within the next three days.
Maybe I’ll take up wood-working.
The download completed and Miles watched a scene shot from a news helicopter. The M-Sof grounds lay in smoking ruins. An excited reporter blathered on and Miles picked out the salient details.
Late last night M-Sof’s Redmond head office was raided by persons unknown. The attack included an unknown number of paramilitary chassis who wired the M-Sof data systems with state-of-the-art ultra-high-density explosives. The Redmond facility lay in smoking ruins. Though the actual body count was low considering the damage, there was an additional piece of disturbing news: the majority of the Scan-driven chassis, both combat and commercial, were missing from the grounds. That same evening several Scan-piloted helicopters disappeared from both Kenmore Air Harbor and Paine Air National Guard Base. NATU investigators assumed they were somehow involved in the attack, but Miles had his doubts. What would they gain? Where would they go? He had a different culprit in mind.
Lokner2.0.
Why? That was easy: Revenge.
But how? That was a better question. How had Lokner2.0 orchestrated such an assault?
Was the government in on this? Lokner had the contacts. Miles thought about it. Nah, that’s too paranoid. Righ
t?
Well, Lokner did have his own little army of combat chassis right here at 5THSUN. Why couldn’t he have more somewhere else? It made too much sense. For some reason Lokner2.0 had destroyed M-Sof and killed Lokner1.0.
This was too much. I’m in way over my head. He had to go somewhere he could think. His stomach rumbled and he thought about mocha chocolate brownies.
Androctonus saw Miles coming and spun to intercept him. Miles found himself staring straight into the chassis’ main weapon cluster.
“Good morning, Mister Pert.” It sounded a little sarcastic, but at least it pronounced his name correctly. “Where are you off to so early?”
“I’m going for lunch,” Miles said curtly.
“You’ve only been here for half an hour.”
“Well I’m hungry. Now move aside.”
Something within the chassis clicked and whined, sounding like it powered up. Miles, staring down the barrel of an Electro-Magnetic Rail-Gun, retreated a step.
“Be. Polite,” said Androctonus, voice flat and emotionless.
The chassis was bluffing. Must be. Miles decided to call that bluff. No way the mini-tank would harm him. “You don’t scare me.” A lie. “Lokner needs me.”
“I talked with Mister Lokner about you this morning,” said the tank.
Androctonus talked with Lokner about me? That couldn’t be good. With Lokner1.0 destroyed during the night, Miles now knew, beyond any doubt, Androctonus and Lokner2.0 were in contact.
“Maybe we got off on the wrong...” Miles glanced down at the tanks treads. He couldn’t say foot and that stopped him dead.
“You will return to your office and do your work.”
“Let’s act like reasonable adults,” suggested Miles, still backing away from the advancing chassis.
Androctonus uttered a hollow metallic cough of derision. “Adults.” The word dripped scorn. “Return to your office. Now.”
“Can’t we talk? What have—”
“Last warning,” threatened the chassis. “I count to three and a cleaning drone will have to scrape you off the floor.”
“Don’t be silly,” said Miles, still retreating.
“One.”
Miles closed his mouth and turned away. He wanted to call something smart-ass over his shoulder but couldn’t think of anything witty enough.
He fled to his office so distracted he barely nodded to Christie as he passed her desk. By the time the door closed behind him he knew he had to do something.
But what?
He collapsed into the SmartChair and it doggedly offered another massage which he ignored. Damned chair. Who could think while being massaged?
Though there might be some doubt as to whether Lokner could kill someone, Miles had little doubt Lokner was capable of having someone killed. The difference might seem minor, but it was one Miles appreciated and understood. He didn’t think he could do either.
He thought back over his conversations with Androctonus. Adults: The mocking scorn of a child. Lokner has black market Scans running illegal chassis. Miles rolled the thought around. No, that was impossible. Yet Androctonus never once came across as an adult.
Androctonus acts like a little kid who knows he’ll get his way.
Miles sat up straight. Androctonus is a child. He had no doubt.
Just a child.
The knowledge, even though unproven, felt like an anchor on Miles’ heart. This one detail meant many, many things. It meant Lokner was not the man Miles thought he was. He would have sworn Mark wasn’t capable of this sort of behavior, but the original Lokner must have set this up. It meant Lokner had ties with the mafia. It meant the man knowingly broke the law and it meant Miles had been helping him. Sure, he knew he’d been helping Lokner break the law, but he’d thought he’d been helping the mastermind of the world’s largest Scanning company get around a few nit-picky rules. By aiding and abetting Lokner, had he been helping a dangerous criminal steal children’s brains?
Aiding and abetting. He didn’t like those words at all. They sounded very legalese.
Miles considered some of the things he’d done—the many government systems he’d hacked—to help Lokner. What had he been thinking, that it was all innocent fun? Sometimes he was so dumb!
Did Lokner know Miles knew (or at least suspected)? He couldn’t chance it. And there was the truth. One man threatened all of Mark Lokner’s plans. Miles Pert, Senior Systems Administrator. Root. Why the hell didn’t I see this before?
“Dumbest genius ever,” Miles muttered.
If Lokner was involved in crèches and black market Scans, he’d been at it since before his death.
Can I go to the law? The more Miles thought about it, the thinner his evidence appeared. If he went to the authorities and blew the whistle on Lokner the ramifications bore some thought. For sure it would cost him his job, but he wasn’t at all sure he could prove his suppositions. The idea of turning Lokner in only to find out he was wrong about the whole situation left him with cold sweats.
What if Androctonus was a middle-aged juvenile twerp? Maybe he should do nothing. That might be safest. Stay low and quiet. What had Ruprecht said? You always think of reasons not to do things.
Damn it!
Fear of change. Well, he had something bigger to be afraid of now.
The more he realized how deeply entwined he was in Lokner’s machinations, the less he believed Mark would ever let him get free. That scared the hell out of him.
Miles tried to calm his staccato heart.
“Gird your loins, brave knight.” Whatever that meant. It was time. It was time he stood up to Lokner. It was time he stood up for himself. You always think of reasons not to do things. Not today. It was time he was proactive.
Maybe after another brownie.
No. Now.
“I might be a moron, but I’m also a genius,” Miles reminded himself. No way a psychotic Scan of an ass-clown like Mark Lokner was going to get the best of him.
Miles tapped at the desk, loading his coding software. It was time to make use of all those trapdoors he’d co-opted from the other M-Sof staff. Lokner doesn’t know who he’s messing—
The desk chirped for attention. It was Lokner2.0.
Oh. Damn. And the ass-clown wanted a full virtuality meeting. Unless he was ready to fake a full-on vomit attack, there was no avoiding it. Miles accepted the meeting and stood in Lokner’s office. Since they were linked by the company’s intranet and didn’t rely on outside networks, the virtuality was bright and crisp and running at full resolution. Miles knew it wasn’t real, but it looked real. It looked perfect.
“Miles.”
“Sir?”
“Sit the fuck down.”
Miles sat and his point of view once again shrank to that of a four year old. He stared up at Lokner. Just a mind game, it’s just a mind game. Changes nothing. Yeah, baloney.
Mark pursed his lips and nodded happily down at Miles. “What were you doing?”
Miles swallowed uncomfortably. “Nothing?” Crap, that sounded like a question.
Mark’s face dropped the happy look like it weighed too much. It seemed to leak out the bottom. There was a long pause while he gave Miles a disappointed glower, as if he expected better. “Androctonus told me what happened in the lobby.”
“Yes?” Miles dedicated most of his brain to keeping his face from betraying emotion.
“I want to hear your side.”
My side? Androctonus threatens me and now Lokner wants to hear my side? Miles blinked and then caught himself and quashed the expression of dumbfounded disbelief before it got past his eyes. Play it like it was nothing. What else could he do? “A minor disagreement is all.”
“He shouldn’t have bothered you.” Mark glanced over Miles’ shoulder, toward the office door. “Did you hear that?”
Miles shook his head. “No Sir. It wasn’t a big deal,” he lied.
Mark kept glancing towards the door. “That’s good,” he said, distracted.
It is? “So...”
“So what were you doing?”
“System maintenance,” Miles said quickly.
“Seriously?”
“I—”
“You can’t hear that? Something breathing. Maybe a lot of somethings.”
To cover his confusion Miles cocked an ear and made a show of listening. “No Sir. Quiet as a—” He stopped himself before saying grave.
Mark glared through narrowed eyes for several uncomfortable seconds. “Was that your doing?” he asked cryptically.
“Was what my doing?”
“Forget it. Won’t give you the pleasure. Just you remember you’re in this as deep as I am. I go down, so do you. My lawyers are itching to drop this bomb on you. Things go bad, I go fucking nuclear.” He giggled. “Nuclear. Clear? All I’ve done is hidden the fact I was scanned. You? You hacked government systems, stole data, and erased all kinds of evidence. They’d never let you near another computer for as long as you lived.”
Lokner knew all the right buttons. Miles opened his mouth but couldn’t think of anything to say. Yeah, way to crush this problem.
“I think there’s even evidence you’re connected to the Mob,” said Lokner.
“The Mob?”
“I know! Crazy, right?”
Miles stared at Lokner. Yes. Crazy.
“So,” said Lokner, glancing back to his desk, “system maintenance. Then why did you say nothing?”
Because I’m a moron. “Because if I start explaining the intricate details I’ll get all excited and go off on a highly-technical tangent. It’ll bore the crap out of you. I was trying to stall myself. The finer points of the inner-workings of a system like this are really very interesting. It’s a fine balance between—”
“Right.”
“I was—”
“You know, Miles,” Lokner dragged out each word. “I can tell when you’re lying.”
“I...” What could Miles say? The truth, that he’d been planning a way to threaten his boss should things go badly? That he was giving himself the edge in any future negotiations? Was there a more positive-sounding spin on that? “I...”
“I...I...” Lokner2.0 mimicked in a petulant child’s voice. “You shouldn’t lie to me Miles. Not healthy.”
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