by Terry Schott
"I will, Daddy," she said. "There's nothing to worry about. I imagine that some adult or another will be close by at all times."
"If I did my job right, then yes, there will be."
"What's the deal with Kenny?" Sam asked. "He get to keep playing, or will he get the boot?"
"That depends on my conversation with his father," Harry said. "I plan on meeting with him tonight or tomorrow. If all goes well, then Kenny gets to keep playing, with a severe warning from Game Central and assurances that if he ever breaks the number one rule again, he will be dropped from SHEPHERDS immediately."
"That's good," Sam said. "I've been keeping a close eye on him. He's a very good player."
"I bet he is," Harry said. "I'm also guessing his old man will be quite talented at playing. He's going to have to agree to join us if Kenny has any hope of staying in."
"Do we want that?" Dawn asked. "I know we try to keep old adult involvement to a minimum, right?"
Harry laughed and shook his head. "That sounds horrible, but you're right. I don't know if he will be up for it or not, but after our meeting things will be decided one way or the other."
Dawn's ansible chirped. She looked at it, smiled, stood up, and hugged both men. "That's my ride. Don't worry about me too much, I'll be fine. Love you both." She grabbed her small carry-on bag and walked to the door.
"Love you too," Harry said. "Call me if you have any problems. I'll see you in two days."
Dawn smiled and walked to the car out front. One of the older players was driving her to the train station, where she would catch a ride to City Three.
Where she would meet up with Logan.
He'd promised to answer more of her questions and show her many new things. Logan had assured her that no one would spot them together on the trip.
He'd better be right, or Dad will be furious.
14
"Tranton Reid?"
Tranton took a sip of coffee and smiled amiably. "Yeah, that's me. You're Harry Thorn, right?"
"You've heard of me?"
Tranton inclined his head. "Everyone's heard of you, Harry."
"I guess so," Harry looked at the empty chair across from Tranton. "Mind if I join you?"
"I'm leaving in a few minutes, but sure, grab a seat."
Harry sat down and took a drink of coffee as he glanced around the room. After a moment , he looked at Tranton. "Your boy Kenny is playing a new video game."
"Really?" Tranton shrugged, as if this were news. "I'm not surprised to hear that; the boy is always playing some new game or another. That seems to be the world we live in these days."
"He told you about this one," Harry said, watching for cues.
"Okay." Tranton took another sip. "Look, Harry, it's nice to meet you, but I have to get to work soon. If you just want to talk about video games, I don't mind, but I'm picking up a vibe like you're the cop and I'm a criminal or something."
"Are you?" Harry asked.
"No, my record is squeaky clean, not that it's any business of yours." Tranton finished his coffee and started to put his jacket on. "I wish I could say this was fun, but you're a little too intense for me."
"I know who you really are."
Tranton hesitated briefly. "I don't know what you're talking about."
"You're lying," Harry said.
After a significant pause, Tranton met Harry's eyes. "Look, Harry. You come in here and ask to sit down at my table. After knowing me for all of three minutes, you start making cryptic remarks and expect me to know what the hell you're talking about? I'm getting a bit concerned. Am I gonna have to call the police? What did I do to make you suddenly show up and behave so strangely?"
Harry's stare turned flat and cold. "I know you're a Hearthkin. A Hearthkin living in the wrong city, and I want to know why you're here."
Tranton looked puzzled, then laughed. "That's what this is all about?" he asked. "Thank God, I thought it was something serious."
Harry's voice was like an icy blade. "It is serious," he said. "Your Family has no business living here, and you know it."
Tranton smiled, leaned forward to whisper. "Look. My dad wanted nothing to do with our Family. He left Wallaceton when I was just a kid. Changed our name and never looked back."
"What happened that would make your father leave? And why did they let him go? No one just picks up and leaves a Family that powerful. Your grandfather Archibald has very detailed plans for every member of his Family. I find it very hard to believe he would've let your dad go."
"How do you know so much about my Family?" Tranton asked.
"You're joking, right? I did introduce myself properly, I think. I'm a Thorn."
"You certainly appear to be one in my side at the moment," Tranton muttered, "but I don't see what that has to do with my question."
Harry frowned. "You don't know anything about your family heritage, or mine?"
Tranton shook his head. "No, that's what I've been telling you."
Harry looked at Tranton and nodded. "Okay, then, I'll tell you what. You seem like a good guy. Your story matches my research."
"What research? You've been doing research on me?"
Harry ignored the question. "Kenny told you all about the game, SHEPHERDS." Tranton started to shake his head, but Harry held up a hand. "It's good that you deny it; shows me you understand the rules better than your boy does. But I know for a fact he told you, so drop the pretenses."
Tranton raised one eyebrow and became still.
"I'm authorized to make a special offer to you. Would you like to join the group and start playing SHEPHERDS with us? I'm not sure how much Kenny told you, but it's considerably more than your average game."
"There's an opportunity to make money from playing it," Tranton said. "A substantial amount of money."
"That's right."
"Since we're being honest–"
"That's precisely what I intend for us to be," Harry interjected.
"—the opportunity to play and make money is all I've been able to think about since Kenny showed me the game. I'm not getting any younger, and contracting has been good business, but I would prefer to get out of it and make some serious money."
Harry paused one more time, then smiled and extended his hand. "That's what I'm offering you, Tranton."
Tranton smiled. They shook hands.
15
"This seat taken?"
Dawn smiled and looked up from her ansible. Logan grinned down at her, then tossed his trench coat onto the empty seat. His form-fitting black sweater showed off a muscular physique. He caught her staring at him and smiled. "Like what you see?" he asked, pushing his hair out of his eyes as he sat down opposite her.
"No...well, yes..." she stammered. "It doesn't matter, you're too old for me to be looking at."
"I am?" His eyebrows raised in mock concern. "How old am I?"
I'm blushing. I know it. Traitor face! "Twenty-something?" she guessed.
Logan laughed, a deep, pleasant sound. "Oh wow, that would be horrible!" he exclaimed. "I just turned seventeen a few days ago. I'm gonna pretend you're trying to compliment me in some strange way."
Dawn frowned. "Serious? You're only seventeen?"
"Barely," he said.
"Wow, you do look older than that. And yes, I meant it as a compliment."
"Thanks, I guess," Logan reached over and retrieved his phone from a jacket pocket. "Before we get too cozy, let's see if your dad has anyone in this train car spying on you."
"I already checked," she assured him. "I think I would have detected anyone I knew close by."
Logan snorted as he navigated his phone.
"What? You don't think I can?"
A few seconds passed. He then switched his phone off, nodded, and smiled at her. "I do think you have the know-how. I would bet my life that you don't have the hardware." He reached over and lightly tapped the screen of her phone. "That thing has training wheels on it, Killer. Maybe when it's fully up and running, you'll be
able to do all you think you can with it, but that won't be happening any time soon. Your dad will make sure of that."
"You know my dad?"
Logan's eyes sparkled. "I know of your dad."
Dawn waited. "And?" she asked.
"You read a book by turning to the last page?" he asked, avoiding her question.
"No."
"Then don't go asking questions that aren't ready to be answered yet." A clear note of warning came through the playful grin. "I don't even know how you have time to speak to me right now. Shouldn't you be shearing all the targets on this train before you do anything?"
"Not my territory." And you either know that, or ought to.
"Ahh." He tossed his phone on top of his jacket. "I thought you were going to tell me you already sheared the entire train with one or two simple commands on your ansible."
"How do you know it's called an ansible?"
"How do you know my phone isn't one?"
Dawn frowned and leaned forward to get a closer look at it. Logan grabbed his phone and turned it on before handing it to her. She began to look through its programs. "It does seem like mine, but I see some differences."
"Yeah, you'll notice there are way more icons and programs on mine than yours," he said, looking out the window. "That goes to what I said earlier—that your ansible isn't fully accessible to you yet."
"Training wheels."
"Exactly." He held out his hand, and she put the ansible into his palm with a nod of thanks.
"Why would mine be locked up?"
"'Cause you're new, and if you don't learn each of the commands, then you won't be ready for the more advanced stuff."
"Makes sense."
"It sure does." Logan looked around and then jerked his head to indicate a travelling businessman sitting alone a few rows ahead of them. "Let me show you what I mean."
He reached over and picked up his coat, motioning her to sit next to him. She did. Why can't I concentrate? It's because I learned he's my age. Even my dad would let me date someone just a year older. The idea of her father assenting to a date with Logan almost caused her to giggles out loud.
Logan smiled and pulled up the main screen on his ansible, showing her what he was doing. He indicated an unfamiliar icon in the SHEPHERDS game menu and tapped it. The standard map appeared on the screen, displaying targets moving around inside the train.
"Looks like the account shearing application," Dawn said, referring to the menu to which Kerstin had just gained access.
"Yeah, looks like," Logan agreed. He tapped the target that matched the location of the businessman ahead of them, labelled 'Jason Cantwell.' A brand new menu appeared. Dawn looked at the choices presented and raised an eyebrow.
"What kind of point system is given for activating any of these commands?"
Logan grinned. "You'll see. Pick one."
Dawn scanned the list for a moment before choosing. "Sleep," she said.
"Good choice," Logan tapped the selection and another menu appeared. "Now pick again."
Dawn viewed the new choices. "These selections aren't funny."
"No one said it was," Logan said. "Choose."
"Light sleep."
"Once again, good choice. Glad you didn't select 'Deep Sleep (5 hours min),' 'Coma,' or 'Permanent.'"
"Are there more points for picking the more serious ones?"
"No."
"Then why offer them as selections?"
"Watch and learn the answer for yourself," Logan tapped the command and then pointed at the businessman. Less than a minute later, the man yawned and closed his laptop. He leaned against the window and was asleep in seconds.
"Whoa!" Dawn exclaimed.
"Right?" he asked.
"Did you put him to sleep?"
"Light sleep. He'll wake up if anyone nudges him, or in half an hour."
Dawn was stunned. "How is that possible?"
Logan chuckled. "Stick with me, and I'll show you a lot of cool stuff."
She intended to.
16
"How's it going?" Harry asked through the open doorway to his son's room.
Sam sat before a big computer workstation facing twin 26" monitors. "Not bad," he answered, turning to beckon Harry. His father rolled the spare black leather chair in front of the workstation and sat down. Both monitors displayed hundreds of lines of complicated code.
"This is a very impressive program, Son," he said after a moment's review. "You get it working?"
"Thanks. Not yet, I've made a mistake somewhere. It's a tiny one; I've been searching for the past three hours and can't find it."
"Want help?" Harry was a firm believer that his children should always have the chance to accomplish challenges on their own. Sam appeared to have taken that as far as he could.
"Yeah, a little help would be appreciated, Dad."
Harry pointed to a section of code on the first monitor. "This command is missing a comma," he said.
Sam turned his attention to the line Harry was indicating and laughed as he added the missing comma. "That's it, right? Everything else looks fine?"
"Only one way to find out," Harry said.
Sam saved the changes, then ran the program. A realistic sky, with eagles soaring across it, replaced the lines of code.
The two sat and watched the program run, scanning for glitches. "It's excellent," Harry proclaimed.
"Thanks, Dad."
Harry slapped his son lightly on the back. "It's good to see that I passed some useful talents on to you."
"I think you contributed quite a few traits that I find useful, Dad," Sam said. "Programming might not even be a very significant one."
"You never know," Harry shrugged. "Maybe you'll do something with it later on."
"What did you do with it?"
"Paid the bills for years while I worked for different computer companies and helped them design programs."
"Yeah, but you didn't start making real money until you left those jobs."
"Somewhere out there, an army of coders are writing the programs that run SHEPHERDS, which enables us to enjoy a very good lifestyle," Harry said. "At the top of that mountain is some brilliant person who came up with the game and got it running. Likely some coder who is richer than we will ever be."
"I hadn't thought of that."
"Trust me, son. Don't abandon this hobby. Thorns have a rich history of success, and computers will likely be your best tool."
"We do?"
"We do, what?"
"Thorns have a rich history of success?" Sam asked. "Every once in a while, you say something like that, as if we're part of some big important family or something. Dawn and I have rarely asked about cousins, or grandparents, or aunts and uncles, but that doesn't mean we haven't wondered."
Harry looked at the computer screen. "I wanted to shield you from that, but it may become impossible."
"Dad, what are you talking about? You're starting to freak me out."
Harry stood and squeezed his son's shoulder. "Don't let it bother you, Sam. Our Family does have a long and rich history, and there are some skeletons in the closet that I would prefer to tell you about instead of having you read about them on the Internet."
"The Internet!" Sam hissed. "Why haven't I searched online for our family name?"
"The same reason most people don't," Harry said. "Because they either fail to think of the possibility, or else they imagine a search will return nothing interesting."
"Well, I'll fix that," Sam reached for his keyboard but Harry stopped him.
"Do me a favour, son? Please wait until I can speak with you and your sister together before you go looking on the net for info about the Thorn Family."
Sam opened his mouth to protest, but Harry continued. "You've waited this long. Can't you hold on a few hours longer until your sister comes home? She's been gone for two days now, and Josh will have her back soon."
"Sure, Dad, I can wait a bit longer," Sam said.
"Than
k you," Harry smiled and pressed a key on the keyboard. The screen went back to code. "Why don't you show me how you would go about adding some land and a few different birds to your simulation?"
The two sat together for the next half hour, enhancing Sam's program. When they heard the front door open, expecting Dawn, they went downstairs to find out how her trip had gone. They found no Dawn, only Josh sitting alone at the kitchen table with a glass of water and a concerned expression. Harry frowned. "Where's Dawn?"
Josh shook his head. "No idea. She wasn't on the train."
Harry looked at his phone for missed calls or text messages. There were none. Sam did the same. "She didn't try to contact me," he said.
"You've activated her tracker?" Harry asked Josh.
"Yes, but it's not giving me a location on her."
"What about residual camera searches in City Three? That should have turned up a loc on her. Come on, Josh, you aren't a newb. I expect that when you tell me about a problem you've already figured out a solution."
"This could be a big problem, Harry," Josh shook his head. "If she's still in City Three, and I think she must be, then we're going to have a serious problem finding her."
"That's ridiculous," Harry snapped. "Why would we have trouble finding my daughter in a city that we completely control?"
"Because we don't control it."
"What are you talking about?"
"City Three has gone completely dark, Harry," Josh said. "We don't control a single target there at the moment."
17
City Three: six hours earlier...
"That's weird..." Dawn looked at her ansible with concern.
"What is?" Logan asked, not looking up.
"I'm not seeing any targets nearby."
"Restart the application." Like most software, the game got buggy now and then. A fresh restart usually solved the problem.
"I have," Dawn said, "but it didn't help."
The small bell on the cafe's front door tinkled and Logan looked up from his phone. He straightened and put a hand lightly on Dawn's arm. "We've had a fun few days, right?" he asked.
Dawn looked at him and smiled. "Yes, I've had an amazing time with you, Logan."
That's no exaggeration. My first time in a big city by myself. The SHEPHERDS meetings went well. I got to spend all my free time with Logan. Shopping, nice restaurants, movies, and that goodnight kiss last night...