The Elderon Chronicles Box Set

by Tarah Benner

  Jonah scowls. “So you would be able to block someone from accessing that location data?”

  “Theoretically,” says Jared. He looks as though he has no idea where this is going. “Personally I’m more interested in finding out where the little buggers are so I know where not to be.”

  “Well, someone in your company is on my shit list.”

  “What are you talking about?” asks Jared. “No one has access to that data except bot administrators.”

  Jonah meets my gaze. “Mordecai.”

  “Who is Mordecai?” Jared demands.

  Jonah just stares at him for a long moment, as if he’s trying to decide whether we can trust him.

  He looks to me. I shrug.

  I really don’t think that Jared is lying. He nearly wet himself when Jonah tackled him. He doesn’t have the stomach to help orchestrate a terrorist attack. I think he really is clueless about Mordecai.

  “Give him back his tracker thing,” says Jonah as he drags Jared back in the direction we came. “You’re coming with us.”

  20

  Maggie

  As soon as we get Jared back to the Camry, Jonah seems to realize that we have nowhere to go. I can tell he’s reluctant to take Jared back to the air force base. He probably worries that if we return, Colonel Sipps will call a shuttle and have us sent back to Elderon.

  Jonah nods at the pistol holstered at my waist to indicate that I should draw it, and I climb into the backseat to sit with Jared. To me a weapon seems like overkill, but I know we don’t trust him completely.

  Despite the fact that we’ve essentially taken him hostage, Jared seems excited. He’s bursting with questions about Elderon and space, which Jonah shuts down almost immediately.

  It takes us nearly half an hour to escape the police blockade. Heavy-duty military vehicles have begun rolling in, and part of me wishes that we could stick around to see how they plan to neutralize the bots.

  Jonah doesn’t say a word as we drive through town. Traffic has calmed since we first arrived, and it seems as though half the city has fled — or else the police have managed to divert all traffic around Mountain View.

  Jonah turns down a side street and circles back to the main road. He keeps staring out the window, as if searching for something, and I can tell when he finds what he’s looking for.

  He pulls into the parking lot of a cheap motel where a red-lit “vacancy” sign is glowing. It’s a squat beige building with a sad little overhang and a crumbling courtyard wall. Drooping cacti are sticking out of the hard-packed dirt around the building, and a big gray laundry cart is parked along the walkway.

  The rooms all have their own courtyard entrances. There’s a swimming pool littered with floating leaves and a few dirty plastic lawn chairs. Everything about the place has an off-season feel, but it seems like the perfect place to be left alone.

  Jonah pulls over, gets his rucksack out of the trunk, and produces his fat wad of cash. He hands me several crisp paper bills, which are so new they almost feel fake.

  “Go get us a room,” he says. “One close to the end. I’ll stay here and watch our friend.”

  He jerks his head at Jared, who shoots me a quick “don’t leave” sort of look. I don’t argue.

  Part of me feels sorry for the kid, but the other part is grateful to have a concrete task. I’ve been swamped by feelings of helplessness ever since the first wave of attacks. I need to feel as though I’m doing something — even if it’s something simple.

  I go inside the front office and request a room near the end of the building. The older lady behind the counter is unfriendly but efficient. She hands over the keys, and I walk to the room while Jonah pulls the car around.

  The room at the end is dark and shabby, but the lamps cast a comforting glow over the lumpy beds and beige walls. The shades have been drawn to keep the room cool, and an odor of stale cigarette smoke lingers on the carpet.

  There are two double beds, a beat-up bureau, a television, and two brass lamps. The comforters have a gold-and-burgundy leaf design that someone must have thought looked elegant.

  Jonah shoves Jared onto a bed, locks the deadbolt, and turns on the news. The scrolling headlines along the bottom of the screen mention the slain journalists, the death count — now fifty-seven people — and news of another missing CEO.

  “Shit,” Jonah mutters.

  “Who else have they taken?” asks Jared.

  “Si Damm,” says Jonah, reading the name along the bottom of the screen.

  “He runs CentrySystems,” says Jared. “They do surveillance, threat analytics, and cyber offense.”

  “Cyber offense?” Jonah repeats.

  “They contract with every branch of the US military.”

  “Great.”

  “Why are the bots taking CEOs?” I ask. “What does Mordecai want with them?”

  Jared’s eyebrows shoot up. “Are you being serious?”

  Jonah and I exchange a confused look, and Jared lets out a breath of air — as though he’s attempting to explain a concept like gravity to a complete imbecile. “Uh, I don’t know . . . Maybe because they’re the five most powerful people in the universe.”

  “In the universe?” repeats Jonah, his voice full of skepticism.

  “Yeah. The amount of data and technology their companies have access to . . .”

  “Like what?” I ask, feeling uneasy.

  “Well, there’s Strom Van de Graaf for one . . . I’m sure you know who that is.”

  Jonah rolls his eyes, and I give a nod.

  “Then there’s Teegan Henley of Continuum, which is a data mining and analytics company.”

  “English, please,” says Jonah.

  “She knows everything about everyone,” says Jared simply. “Well, her company does. They have location tracking data on, like, eighty-five percent of the population.”

  “That’s creepy.”

  “Yeah. Yeah.” Jared looks excited. “Zuni Monroe is another one. LifeSync is one of our biggest competitors. They specialize in network integration, which is something we’ve been working toward.”

  “English!” Jonah snaps.

  “Think about the connection between your Optix and your desktop,” says Jared, looking frustrated. “The security involved . . . What allows you to do a direct data transfer to one or more trusted sources — remote locks, payments, file sharing, et cetera — that’s what LifeSync does. They bought the company that brought blockchain transactions to the mainstream back in the mid-2000s. The hive mind the bots share is based on technology we designed, but LifeSync tried to sue BlumBot for using it.”

  “Hive mind?” Jonah cuts in.

  “Yeah. All the bots have it. They’re connected. That’s how they’re able to communicate and share data in real time.”

  Suddenly, it clicks — something I understood intuitively actually has a name.

  “That would explain how they were able to shift gears so fast back on Elderon,” I murmur.

  Jonah nods, still trying to absorb all that Jared is throwing at him. “What else? What would Mordecai want with CentrySystems’s technology?”

  “Big brother?” I suggest.

  “Basically,” says Jared. “BlumBot poached one of the CentrySystems developers to create the system all the security bots use to identify threats in a crowd.”

  “That would explain how they were able to target law enforcement in the Times Square attack,” Jonah mutters.

  “But why would Mordecai need Si Damm’s technology if the bots already have it?” I ask.

  Jared shrugs. “The security bots only have access to the databases they’re allowed — to ID criminals and such. But if they had access to more data, like our clients’ . . .”

  “They’d be able to refine their targeting to just about anyone,” I finish.

  “Exactly.”

  “Okay,” says Jonah, looking as though he’s still trying to wrap his head around all the tech mumbo jumbo. “That’s four CEOs. Who’
s the last one?”

  “My boss, Zephyr Morgan.”

  “You guys store people’s data?” I ask.

  Jared tilts his head from side to side with a smug expression on his face. “It’s a bit more complicated than that . . .”

  “Spill,” Jonah growls, clearly annoyed by Jared’s tone of superiority.

  “We have our hands in all kinds of things,” he says. “But mainly, yes. We house and transfer data securely.”

  “Okay . . . And what exactly do you do for . . . What’s it called again?”

  “Vault.” Jared hesitates. “My official job title is Deputy Director of Internal Operations and Executive Data Management.”

  “What?” says Jonah. It’s clear he has no patience for convoluted corporate lingo.

  Jared takes a deep breath. “What you have to understand is that Vault’s number one priority is the security of our data.”

  “Meaning . . .”

  “If you had a hierarchy of our clients and their data, our own data would be at the top.”

  There’s a long beat of silence, and Jonah gives me a look that says “Is this kid for real?”

  Then the television switches from the news anchor’s face to a grainy single-cam video recorded in a dark room. A man with a long sallow face is talking into the camera, and I recognize that face as Mordecai Blum.

  Some people may have noticed that the world’s top CEOs are not among the survivors. Never fear. Si Damm, Zephyr Morgan, Zuni Monroe, Teegan Henley . . . the celebrated Mr. Van de Graaf . . . They are very much alive . . .

  I glance over at Jonah, whose face has turned to stone.

  I have sequestered these leaders where they cannot be found, and as long as they cooperate, they will not be harmed.

  Mordecai pauses.

  I need a little something from each of them . . . something I promise they will not miss. It’s very simple: If they comply, I will release them immediately. If they refuse, they will be killed.

  The screen flips back to the news anchor, who is shaking her head in disgust. She asks the deputy director of the FBI if they have any leads on Mordecai’s whereabouts. He says they are working every possible angle and cooperating with the other law-enforcement agencies. That’s PR speak for “the trail’s gone cold.”

  Jonah mutes the television and tosses the remote onto the bed. “Shit.”

  “You were right,” says Jonah. “He’s using the CEOs to make the bots unstoppable.”

  “They each control some aspect of the technology the bots use, but with Mordecai controlling the CEOs . . .”

  “No one can control them but him.”

  Jared lifts both eyebrows. “Exactly.”

  Jonah frowns, plainly annoyed by Jared’s all-knowing attitude. “I’m sorry. What is it that you do?”

  “I’m the Deputy Director of Internal Operations and Executive Data Management.”

  Jonah gives him a look that says he’s about to pounce, and Jared scrambles to translate his ridiculous job title. “I’m basically Zephyr’s right-hand man.”

  Jonah gives him a dubious look.

  “No, really,” says Jared. “That’s the ‘executive’ part of Executive Data Management. We don’t broadcast it for security reasons, but I handle just about everything that Zephyr doesn’t do for himself.”

  “Like?”

  Jared shrugs and begins to tick off responsibilities on his fingers. “Pick up Zephyr’s coffee, take care of Lord Darnley and Ethalbald . . .”

  “Who?” Jonah splutters.

  “His dogs. They’re Tibetan mastiffs — terrifying to look at but really sweet. They’re each insured for half a billion dollars.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “I wish,” says Jared, raising his eyebrows. “One time Lord Darnley stepped on a cactus . . .” He lets out a nervous laugh. “I thought I was going to lose my job.”

  “What else do you do for Zephyr?” I ask.

  “Mostly, I’m in charge of our bug-out plan.”

  “Bug-out plan?”

  “I’m the only other all-access administrator, apart from Zephyr, of course. It’s my job to manage what we do in an emergency: where to go, who to contact, and how to secure the company’s data.”

  “And Zephyr trusts you with that?” Jonah asks in disbelief.

  Jared straightens up a little on the bed. I can tell he’s offended by Jonah’s implication that he doesn’t seem up for the task. “Zephyr trusts me with his life. More importantly, he trusts me with his dogs’ lives . . . and the life of his company.”

  “And have you executed it?” I ask. “The bug-out plan?”

  “Not entirely,” says Jared. “I instituted the remote-access requirement for triple authentication, but if Mordecai were to have physical access to our servers . . .”

  “Physical access like he got inside the building?” Jonah presses.

  “Yeah. All of our data is stored in the cloud, which just means that we have it on servers here and on servers halfway around the world. I’m not so worried about those servers. But the data housed on-site in our offices here . . .”

  “Mordecai could access it?”

  “Only if Zephyr gave him the code.”

  I glance at Jonah, who looks uneasy.

  “What do we need to do to secure that data?” asks Jonah.

  “I’d need to get inside the building,” says Jared.

  “Okay.” Jonah’s wheels are spinning. I can tell he’s thinking about how we might get Jared inside that building with police crawling all over the valley.

  “But honestly, Mordecai gaining access to our data is only the tip of the iceberg,” Jared continues.

  “Meaning . . .”

  Jared raises both eyebrows. He looks genuinely worried. “You control the CEOs, you control the world.”

  21

  Jonah

  It takes a minute for Jared’s last words to really sink in. You control the CEOs, you control the world.

  “Wait,” I say, squeezing my eyes shut and rubbing the bridge of my nose. “You think Mordecai has a plan that involves using the CEOs to control the world?”

  Jared shrugs. “He could — run the world, I mean. People have no idea how much control those companies have over every aspect of their lives.”

  “It makes sense,” says Maggie after a moment.

  “What? No,” I say. “All Mordecai cares about is getting revenge against his sister.”

  “That’s what we think,” says Maggie.

  “Because he basically told us that.”

  Maggie shakes her head. “I just think there’s more to it than that.”

  “There probably is,” I say. “But there’s no point trying to guess. We just need to figure out what he’s planning and how we can stop him.”

  “How can we figure out what he’s planning if we don’t know what he wants?” asks Maggie.

  “We know what he wants,” I say. “He wants attention — revenge. Whatever. Sooner or later, he’s gonna slip up. Even the best ones do.”

  I’ve spent my life tracking men like Mordecai. What separates terrorists from run-of-the-mill killers is their ideology. Whatever is pushing Mordecai to orchestrate the bot attacks, he feels that it’s justified. His reasoning would never make sense to a normal healthy person, so there’s not much point in trying to figure out exactly what goes on inside his head.

  “It’s respect,” says Maggie finally. “That’s what’s driving Mordecai to do this.”

  “What?”

  “He said something to Ziva about how she and their father never respected him. Ziva was the favorite child. Mordecai was always on the outside looking in. When their father left the company to Ziva, Mordecai took that as a final sign that his father didn’t believe in him. And when Ziva asked him for money . . .”

  “He saw it as another insult,” I say, interested in her theory despite myself.

  “Exactly.”

  It’s a stretch, but Maggie may be onto something. If Mordeca
i felt that his family never took him seriously, he might have carried that with him his entire life. When his sister sent him away to Russia, it was the final straw. He decided to enact his revenge. What better way to earn “respect” than to make the world fear you?

  “Whatever he’s planning, he needs the CEOs,” I say. “Each company he targeted controls some aspect of the bot technology.”

  “Control the bots, control the world,” says Jared darkly.

  “We need to take away his advantage,” I say. “Make sure that he can’t use the CEOs against their companies no matter what.”

  “How?” asks Maggie. “The buildings are all on lockdown. The employees are scattered.”

  I glance at Jared, who’s been watching the ticker along the bottom of the TV closely.

  “I know of at least one company we can take out of the equation,” I say.

  Jared seems to sense us looking at him. He turns and fidgets nervously on the bed. “You want me to help you protect Vault from Mordecai?”

  “That’s right.”

  “How?”

  “By making sure Mordecai can’t access that data.”

  Jared nods slowly, his brows furrowed in deep concentration. I can tell he’s formulating a plan — figuring out how we could break into Vault and change the authentication settings.

  “What about the bots?” asks Maggie. “Mordecai has to be watching that building. When he finds out, he’ll send the humanoids after us.”

  “I might be able to help with that,” says Jared. He twists around, unzips his backpack, and pulls something out.

  It looks like some kind of handheld scanner. A coil of wire is sticking out of the top, and there’s a thick layer of duct tape wrapped around the handle.

  “What is that?” asks Maggie.

  Jared turns it on, and the room is filled with a sort of low hum — almost as though the device is charging up.

  “I started working on it after the first attacks,” he says excitedly.

  I stare at the homemade device, which looks more like some middle-school science-fair project than a deadly weapon. “What is it?”

  “It’s designed to short out the bots’ electrical systems,” he says in a breathless voice. “You just charge it up, touch it to a bot, and — zap!”