by Andrew Ives
She reached the checkout and the delivery section. She could have her shopping delivered sometime today free of charge or pay extra to have it immediately.
"What the hell? I ain't paying." She thought, clicked on the `immediately' box and entered Sedgwick's card number.
"Coming right away" came the sampled reply. Karen's computer filled the supermarket in on her address details while a "Thank you for shopping at Veeyar Supermarkets. Come again soon." sign appeared, shortly followed by adverts. Karen impatiently and rapidly stabbed at the space bar until she was back at her usual bank of icons; just like arriving home.
Trepidation
Jeff Scott wondered exactly how he had been cajoled into helping Simon Allen with his mischievous scheme. The phrase 'aiding and abetting' kept springing to mind as he continued on his way, questioning whether his rather transparent lie really was going to obtain the information Simon needed.
Jeff was never in Simon's class at school, for any lessons. They were friends merely through living near each other throughout their childhood. Jeff had always realised Simon was using him to further his own causes, yet for some reason he still considered Simon a friend. Simon was always arrogant and usually condescending, but Jeff tolerated this to keep in with his 'cool' friend.
Simon was, to normal people, by no means 'cool' - he was a nerdy nerd of the worst kind. Simon was of above average intelligence, but nothing like as outstanding as he led people to believe. He was as cowardly as his anonymous, small-fry computer frauds suggested, but when he exaggerated the enormity of these 'anarchic security violations' and fraudulantly purchased small electronic gadgets with the proceeds, gullible Jeff was taken in by the false 'coolness' Simon exuded.
It was in an effort to attain some of this credibility that Jeff had found himself in this situation.
Simon had his fake video identity already rendered, but he needed an outlet for its use. If Simon really was as clever as he purported to be, then he would have found this outlet first and done the rendering later, but he wasn't. He had gone through all the rigmarole of raytracing already and Jeff now felt the burden was on him to find the phone number Simon needed. Jeff felt he had to deliver the goods.
The phone number Simon needed was for direct calling to the internal offices at Dreamland - The Pixel People. Simon already had the face and voice from the video, he had the office background digitised and drawn over, all the face frames rendered and the program to play them all on. All that remained now was some of Dreamland's internal phone numbers, but these of course were ex-directory. These numbers were only known to Dreamland employees and the computers of the telecommunications company, or telco.
It was the gates of this local telco exchange that Jeff was nervously approaching.
Fabrication
Jeff strolled into the yard as if the "Authorised Personnel Only" sign meant nothing to him.
The row of parked vans seemed a lost cause in his search for information and it looked as though Jeff may even have to venture inside the exchange itself. Jeff was obviously reluctant to do this as his lie would fool few people in there.
Around the perimeter stood a few small wooden sheds and a larger detached building which housed the emergency generators. These looked slightly more promising if only for the fact that they were less populated.
Jeff spied a small rubbish skip behind one of these sheds, and was walking towards it when suddenly an engineer emerged from behind a blind corner of the exchange walls.
"What are you up to?" asked the engineer in an aggressive Japanese accent. He appeared to be a stern, no-nonsense kind of person and Jeff was ready to run should things get too uncomfortable for him.
"Errr... I'm looking for my dog." Jeff held up the retractable lead he brought with him to add to his story's minimal conviction. When the Japanese man looked unimpressed, Jeff added:
"He's a small, black dog called Sparky. He ran away from me in the park over there and I haven't seen him at all. Did you see him come in here?" Jeff hoped his distressed face would be heart-rending to even the hardest of people.
"No, I never saw him. I give you a couple minutes to look then you go - dog or no dog. We cannot have kids running around this place. I want you gone by time I come back." The engineer relented more than he felt he should have, turned away and climbed into one of the parked vans.
Jeff ran over to the skip, half-heartedly calling 'Sparky' all the while. When he was half-obscured by the shed, he rummaged around frantically for something, anything, that might be of some help.
Inside there were some old broken phones, bags and boxes of various junk, sales literature and wads of computer printouts. He took the top wad of paper and although they seemed useless to him, he hoped Simon might make more of them. He stuffed the printout down his jacket top, calling 'Sparky' as he did so.
Making sure it was hidden, Jeff walked slowly back towards the gates, head drooped, when the engineer called out.
"Hey, kid. This your dog?" The man carried in his arms a small black and white puppy.
Jeff wondered where the man had found a dog so quickly. Was it a trick? It was vaguely similar to that which Jeff described. If Jeff said it was, would he be questioned?
"No, that's not Sparky. He's a collie. Thank you all the same." With that Jeff left through the gates.
The engineer smiled and put his dog back in his van. Jeff hadn't fallen for his trick. He stroked his puppy, safe in the knowledge that Jeff probably had been telling the truth.
Acceleration
Karen received a buzz on her intercom, requesting that she should come downstairs to collect her groceries. The delivery man was curt and had gone before she could thank him.
The sky was barely light outside, dawn had been smothered by a combination of overcast clouds and sulphurous air. Karen wondered whether it was wise to collect her food just yet. Only yesterday she had seen a car being stolen directly outside. She felt she was worrying too much, so she grabbed her jacket, door keys and left.
That very moment, two teenage thieves were tampering with a motorcycle. One sat astride the bike, the other operated a hand-held remote control. The gadget rapidly tried thousands of combinations of infra-red locking sequences. The two hoods had been there for a few minutes now and were justifiably getting edgy.
The rider twisted the stiff throttle, flicked some switches on the handlebars and they prepared to make their getaway.
Karen entered the lift and pressed the 'Base2' button. There was a ping and the doors closed. Slowly she travelled down through the many floors.
The electrics kicked in, the engine started, the rider twisted the throttle and the other young thief jumped on behind. He clumsily trod the bike into gear and the duo gingerly pulled away.
The lift doors pinged open and Karen stepped out. Her groceries were stored in a locker in the corridor. As she walked over to it, she heard a familiar engine sound outside, revving unusually loudly. She ran to the window and then to the door.
The two thieves were pleased to have successfully stolen another vehicle. The rider was visibly less happy than his pillion passenger. They had turned around, but the bike was revving wildly and uncontrollably in second gear. He tried everything he knew, but still it would not run correctly.
Suddenly a screaming woman ran out of the building and realising she had to be the owner, they had to escape as quickly as possible. A van immediately blocked her path, buying the rider precious seconds, but as he stamped the gear lever into third, the bike took off. Its ferocity and acceleration were too much to handle and it was all he could do to stay on.
Again the revs increased. Trying to change down to third, he unwittingly trod the lever into fourth.
The pillion passenger was becoming worried and shouted for his friend to slow down. The rider wrestled the throttle with both hands before shouting: "I can't the throttle's stu..."
Karen ran out into the road just in time to see her precious bike hit the parapet wall and explode into
a shower of burning embers. The two riders careered over the wall onto the dual carriageway a hundred feet below. The van disappeared before becoming embroiled any further.
Karen ran over to her burning bike, twisted and smashed beyond recognition. Pieces of broken fairing lay all around. The advanced frame and fairing design had not saved them from injury in the slightest and Karen was thankful she hadn't been riding it.
A crowd began to gather. Karen left her bike and returned to her flat to call the police. She collected her shopping and again took the lift back upstairs.
During the ascent, she wondered whether that shot to the bike last night had caused the bike to go out of control as it obviously had done.
If it had, then she could well have been blown up herself and was extremely fortunate not to be the next person to ride it. She couldn't understand how such minor damage could have such a dramatic effect.
Her feelings were a mixture of relief and mourning at the same time. She had had that bike since she was eighteen, when she passed her test. It was the only bike she had ever owned and now it was a burning wreck.
When the lift doors opened, she was further horrified to find her apartment door left ajar. The latch had been crunched open - apparently by hydraulic bolt cutters.
* * *
Violation
Karen cautiously approached the doorway to her flat, splinters of doorframe littered the floor everywhere she trod. She eyed with apprehension the mangled remains of the lock hanging from the tattered wooden surround. The five in her house number, 335, nowhere near the door, had even been warped as the massively strong power tool had dug into the frame to tear the lock out.
Silently she crept over the threshold, gingerly pushing the door open and peering around as it moved back. She put her groceries on the floor and picked up the moderately solid umbrella she always kept by the door. She tapped it against her other hand, realising it would have little effect on who or whatever had the strength to wreck her lock like that, but it was the best she had.
She crept along her hallway, flinging open the lounge and kitchen door with one hand while wielding the folded umbrella above her head.
Karen's pulse quickened with each door, the likelihood of finding the intruder increasing with every empty room. On reaching the kitchen, she exchanged the umbrella for a far more effective steak knife and continued to investigate the rest of the apartment. She was adamant that this burglar would not escape unscathed.
Next she opened her bedroom door, slashing the air wildly as it slammed back. The room seemed clear; untouched even.
Then the bathroom; again no different to usual.
Only her spare bedroom, the computer room, remained.
She kicked open the door... and immediately saw the reason for this intrusion.
Her computer had been torn from its sockets. Leads had fallen as the keyboard had been yanked from the desk, and it was now left face down on the floor, the casing pulled apart and the hard drive missing.
It was apparent that the data on the hard drive - the software for PsiNapse which she had replaced with the disk she had stolen from Psi, was worth more to other people than she had imagined.
It had always seemed to her that without the PsiNapse hardware (or at least full knowledge of it), the software would be of little more than novelty value, everything in it being specifically written around the hardware they were developing.
Of course, the code would be some indication of the hardware they were intending to use, but as these components were unique and exclusive to Psi (the ROMs being blown by Psi themselves) this indication would be of minimal use. Anybody with some depth of computing knowledge would know what magnitude of processing power PsiNapse required and this was just about all that could be gleaned from the code Karen had just had stolen. She couldn't understand what anyone could hope to achieve from it.
Obviously, coupled with the hardware, the code was of far greater use and it was possible that someone had copies of Psi's custom chips, had diagrams or knew how to make their own ROMs. But who?
Whoever it was, they knew she had the hard drive in her possession. As far as Karen knew, nobody else knew she had it. She stole it from Psi in her burglary and even the police hadn't connected her to the events of that night, let alone anyone else.
When Psi was destroyed by fire, it was possible that whoever the perpetrator was, killed Sedgwick and then, thinking the thief that he shot at was Eric, completed the job of killing Eric afterwards. The police got the whole affair mixed up and now believing Eric to be the culprit, have left this lunatic free and unhindered.
Meanwhile after killing Eric, said lunatic had rightly figured Karen to be the thief. He then seized his chance and stole the data and drive from her flat while she was being distracted by her bike exploding below... Now it did all make sense. It wasn't just a complicated coincidence.
Hopefully this person would be satisfied with just the data and not find it necessary to return and kill her too. Karen decided she would keep the knife close at hand.
Karen had made floptical disk copies of some of the data - mainly her contributions to the PsiNapse project. This was mostly only the realtime array recognition and related routines, but now she was glad she had done or she would be back to square one again.
Karen closed her front door the best she could, put the bolt on and, with the corridor light still shining through the gaping hole in the frame, left to find some tools to temporarily fix the damage with.
From the airing cupboard, she heard a quiet whimpering sound. On opening, Winky crept out cowering and visibly shaken. He pawed at his lower jaw which was bleeding from around a few teeth. The intruder had obviously shut the unfortunate dog in the cupboard after being impeded by his barking and snapping.
Shaggy Dog Story
Winky was a tan and off-white mongrel which Karen had taken in eight months ago, ever since finding him in the alleyway next to Psi's buildings.
That evening Karen had a puncture in her front tyre which delayed her from leaving work. While filling the inner tube with mousse temporarily to get her home, a dog emerged from amongst the dustbins and licked her, scavenging for food. The dog's left eye was in a sorry state, weeping and surrounded by flies, apparently having been bitten by a rat.
Normally she would have steered clear of such a liability, but she had to have compassion for this affectionate, if exceptionally grotty, animal.
Karen originally intended just to care for the dog until his eye was healed, but despite deliberately not naming him and making a conscious effort not to get attached, the inevitable happened.
The dog proved to be a perfect companion, and it was not long before Harry visited and remarked that the dog winked a lot. Karen explained it was because of his infected eye, but Harry kept referring to the dog as 'Winky'; and the apt, if rather unkind, name stuck.
Winky was about to repay Karen for her kindness. During his struggle with the intruder, Winky had bitten the man's thigh which slowed him down considerably. He had also torn a button from the bottom of the intruder's raincoat, the nylon thread cutting his gum. The intruder kicked the interfering dog into the dark cupboard, and painfully skulked away with just the item he intended to steal rather than staying to finish the job. Winky had saved Karen far more than she would ever imagine.
Financial Irregularities
That afternoon, Karen decided to try to put back together what was left of her computer. The keyboard hadn't been badly damaged, the floptical drives were left safe in their housing and after replacing all the leads in their rightful places, the computer was up and running. The trapper looked a bit wobbly though and she couldn't fathom out why this hadn't been taken.
However, the internal hard drive was now missing and everything Karen needed had to be run from floptical disks. This was painstaking and laborious and she wondered whether it might be quicker to format and install one of the new blank disks she stole from Psi. She decided against it as she only needed to l
oad her modem environment to start hacking on Sedgwick's account again. She sorted through a pile of unlabelled disks and put one in the drive.
While it loaded she opened up the Z-bed and called Winky up. He never came, so she went to find him and in doing so kicked a button along the hall. It seemed it wasn't one of hers and she soon realised it had to belong to the intruder. Somehow it seemed familiar, but she couldn't place where she had seen it.
Winky came into the hall and followed Karen back to her computer which had now loaded.
The modem environment appeared and soon she dialled up the Staffordshire and Norfolk again. The list of options reappeared and she remembered that she had no joy before with the GoldSave account, the account for regular savers. Karen decided that it was just about feasible that Sedgwick had savings above that range. If it was below, she was not interested anyway.
She entered F8 for the 10K-50K range and at the prompt typed "Sedgwick S." Again it replied that there was no known account holder of that name and that she should exit.
Karen returned to the main menu, pressed F9 for the next range up and repeated the procedure. Again she was turned away and dumped out of the program.
After waiting five minutes and redialling, she rather hopefully tried the 150K+ account and was taken aback when it asked her to verify her identity with a voice print (if from home), or a retina scan if she was at an outdoor ATM.
Fortunately, she had the sound sampling facilities and so opted for the voice print. She was requested to say her name into the microphone and press the space bar.
Knowing her voice would be recognised as completely different to Sedgwick's, she said "Open sesame" and pressed the trapper button.