Authors: Joel Shepherd
"What's your name, kid?" came Vanessa's voice from back down the hall, above the muffled thump of approaching armour, a fast, light stride. The young agent frowned over Sandy's shoulder.
"My name is Agent Patziano," with an emphasis suggesting a dislike at being called 'kid'. "Lieutenant...?"
"Rice," Vanessa drawled, "I led the raid that got you armchair wonders in here without getting your pretty suits creased. How'd you like to feature on my report to Krishnaswali — all about how you blocked Ibrahim's special addition to my team from doing the job she was personally assigned by him to perform? I reckon that'd hit Ibrahim's vision within about five minutes of my submission."
Patziano stared at her. The towering guards to either side offered no comment. Vanessa stopped before him, and gave a pleasant smile.
"Well?"
Patziano blinked and looked at Sandy. Sandy waited. She was good at that, given something to wait for.
"I'll, um ..." A quick, nervous glance back over his shoulder at the milling crowds in the office beyond.
"You realise," Vanessa said pleasantly, "that you're standing toe-to-toe with the most dangerous killing machine in the known universe and telling her to go jump in a lake?" Patziano blinked again. "Kid, you don't need a medal, you need a brain transplant." He stared at Sandy. Sandy tried to look innocent. Back at Vanessa. Vanessa flicked her head toward the crowds. Patziano swallowed.
"I'll just... um ... go and tell them ..."
"Just let us in, huh?" He blinked again and nodded. An invisible signal, and the glass doors opened. An audio channel triggered Sandy's uplink reception as they followed Patziano inside ... Vanessa's frequency. She opened it.
"
Fear and greed, Sandy
," came Vanessa's voice in her ear as they walked. "
In the world of civvies, those are the two best levers. Promotions, reputations, personal advancement, those are the weak spots. But you gotta make it personal, don't let him hide behind his rank ...In the military it's all impersonal, here you've gotta figure the difference. It's all who you know and what they think of you
."
"
Most dangerous killing machine in the known universe
?" Sandy formulated in silent reply, with mild indignation.
"
GIs are more dangerous than straight humans
," Vanessa replied matter-of-factly, "
and you're the most dangerous GI
."
"Oh." Glumly, as Patziano opened the interior office doors and let the pair of armoured SWAT operatives inside. "
I suppose I am, aren't I
?"
Milanovic, she noted, was seated on a large leather sofa before a panoramic vista that stretched about the entire office in a giant semicircle. Up here at the tower's peak, the structure tapered, allowing for wrap-around views. A procession of towers under an increasingly ominous sky, a view so clear and sharp she could almost feel the chill wind.
Advisors and other executives conferred in low tones about the room, examining their data-slates with full uplinks running, arguing heatedly with various CSA suits about them. This giant melee was just the beginning, sorting out the order of battle. The real action, Sandy guessed, would start later, when each side retired to private quarters to scheme and counter-scheme ad infinitum. That part would doubtless go on for months. Or probably years.
She moved in Milanovic's direction, shouldering daintily past suits who started in alarm to find a pair of armoured women pushing into the room. The junior execs and advisors who flanked the Tetsu chairman on the sofa and stood before the windows looked up from a group of CSA questioners seated opposite, several of whom turned.
"What's the problem?" one asked, half-rising from her seat. Armour meant trouble, and was evidently rarely seen in analysis and briefings.
"No problem," Sandy said, "I'm Cassidy, I've got some questions." Some incredulous looks from CSA suits.
"Excuse me," one said testily, "you can't just come in here and ..."
"Yes she can," said a new voice at her side. Sandy glanced across and found Naidu there. "Top priority, if she believes it to be so ... Mr Milanovic, do you mind?"
Milanovic returned a cold stare. A heavy-set man with a thick neck and sharp features under black, wavy hair.
"How many levels of executive security clearance do you have within your personnel structure," Sandy asked him.
"Fourteen," Milanovic said blankly.
"What designation, format and serial code?" Milanovic glanced aside at an aide...
"Vector-star, Triple HT Overlock, serial code command Eight-Star-Ninety." A young woman from behind the sofa, data-slate in one hand. "Subnumeracy is classified, private Tetsu property protected even under emergency legislation ..."
"That's yet to be decided," a CSA agent objected. "We've never tested this legislation on subnumeracy serial codings ..."
"No matter," Sandy interrupted, beginning to get some idea why so many people were here in the room. She knew some basics of corporate law and civilian security legislation, and in a peaceful place like Tanusha it was all untested ... the legal uncertainties would run all the way down. Not for the first time she suffered the disorienting realisation of just how far over her head so much of this situation went ... "Are you certified secured against anything in the K-Nova series? Or the Hex-2s?"
The young woman blinked. "That's ... not commonly found around here." Looking slightly bewildered.
"Software's not my strong point," Naidu said from beside her. Watching the Tetsu network expert's face with sharp, narrowed eyes. "What are K-Novas and Hex-2s?" Sandy halted her reply on sudden inspiration. Looked at the woman.
"You tell him," she said. The Tetsu tech blinked again, uncertainty growing, shifted her weight. In this part of the room, beyond the surrounding confusion all was still. Agents watched, eyes mercilessly intent, searching for any unwitting clue. Sandy figured she'd asked a good one.
"Well ..." the tech said eventually, "they're reputed to be League infiltration programs. I've never seen one." Recovering her confidence with blunt honesty. "They're sometimes talked about ... industry talk, gossip and rumours, mostly. Some people even think they're just rumours ... stories invented by someone."
"They exist," Sandy said calmly, more for the agents' benefit than the Tetsu crowd's. "They're very common in Dark Star. Military construct, direct from League military science labs. There are so many mutations and variations by now that even the designers have lost count, there's only the macro-patterns to identify them."
Several of the agents were looking at
her
now. But she didn't mind that.
"They have carrier-bands," she continued. "Quantum-encryption disguises stored data. It's a parasite program, like a smart virus, runs through large databases like these corporate ones, gathers security data, passwords, encryption, facilitates its own movement further and further into the network and passes all data out hidden in regular traffic. Nearly impossible to detect."
"There's not a parasite program Cody can't trace," Milanovic objected with a dark frown. "League biotechnology is well beyond Federation, but they have no such infotech advantage."
"Um ... actually, sir," the young tech nervously intervened, "that may be true, but there's a lot of military and security-apparatus funded programming activity, especially in the quantum and AI fields, that has diverged very sharply over the last eighty years or so ... they've had almost no contact with each other. They've been kept very secret because Federation/League relations were bad from about then, so there's been no cross-pollination, and both streams of research have become very alien to each other ... The result is they cant really stop ours, and we can't really stop theirs."
"So I take it," Sandy said, "that you're not proofed?"
The tech grimaced. "Well, it is fairly hard to be proofed against something we've never seen and is generally beyond the technology of our best net corporates to counter."
"Considering the degree of League biotech infiltration in Tanusha," one agent said, "I find that a pretty remarkable attitude."
"There has been no infiltration of League agents or data into Tetsu Consolidated," one of the corporates stated blankly. Which no one even bothered to respond to.
"Can you actually stop a K-Nova?" one of the agents asked Sandy.
"Stop, no, I doubt it, not with present Federation resources. Deflect, confuse, block and generally engage in damage limitation ... yes. But only if you know it's there, and if you prepare for it. Or you could flush the entire system, but obviously we can't expect them to do that... much."
"Systems flush requires the shutdown of essential services," another agent commented. "That'd be as good as admitting there was an infiltration. And of course there's
no
infiltration." Sarcastically. There was, Sandy realised, something unexpected going on. They were coming over to her side. All the CSA, backing this line of attack. It surprised her. Doubtless it surprised them too.
"Wait a minute," said the young Tetsu tech from across the low table, frowning deeply, "if you know all this stuff about League infiltration runners, why haven't you told us? Government departments are legally obligated to pass on any security information to private companies ..."
"Who ask for assistance," said an agent, "first you have to ask..."
"No way. Matters of national security are the Callayan government's job to predict, research and counter..."
"And the enforcement of biotech policy is a matter of individual corporate responsibility, to be monitored by tech-gov..."
"How
do
you know all this?" Milanovic interrupted. Arms heavily folded across his broad chest. His dark eyes were narrowed, staring straight at Sandy. "A SWAT agent. Not even an officer." So he could read the shoulder pips. "Who the hell
are
you? Barging in against the initial wishes of even your own people?" With a glare at the agents seated across from him. Looking for leverage, Sandy reckoned. Divisions within the CSA. Splits. Politics, to be exploited at higher levels. Parliament, Senate reviews, elected reps ...
"You underestimate SWAT, Mr Milanovic," said Naidu, coming to the rescue. "They read much intelligence on League capabilities — that is one of Callay's primary threats."
"Have you made any attempt," Sandy cut in, "to defend, isolate, locate or otherwise search for such League infiltration software?"
"I told you," the tech retorted with growing frustration, "no one in Tanusha's sure these programs even exist. How can we defend against them?"
"Thank you," Sandy said. Took Naidu's arm with a gloved hand (carefully) and led him over to an empty area by the huge, floor-to-ceiling windows. To her surprise, several other agents gave up their strategic seats and hurried over to join them, forming yet another cluster in the spacious office. Beyond the plexiglass, Tanusha sprawled, the lights of the airborne traffic flashing beneath the dark and wind-torn ceiling of cloud.
"There's no way they haven't heard of K-Novas or Hex-2s," she told Naidu, her voice just loud enough to carry to the several others who gathered close by. From the lack of carrying, recognisable sound from about the room, she knew it had been suppressed ... portable devices could do that, neutralise voice-width sound by counter pulse so that soft voices would not carry more than three or four metres — even to bio-enhanced hearing, that being the main danger. "It's more than just a rumour, it's standard knowledge for League Intel ops. If they're aware of League biotech policy they'll
know
the infiltration software."
"Do you know?" Naidu asked the agent at Sandy's armoured elbow.
"I know Hex and Nova, how they're used and some running examples, but the details are impossible ... I doubt even the FIA know. Ms Cassidy," turning to Sandy, "we
really
need to have a long talk. I can't
believe
no one thought to mention that side of your knowledge to me."
"April," Naidu said with deadpan irony, "meet Ying Tuo, CSA Network Security head." They shook hands carefully. "We only got her cleared from custody last night, Tuo." With mild reprimand. "You'll all get your chance eventually."
"Do you think you could find traces?" Tuo pressed her. A tall man, she had to look up to meet his gaze. She considered.
"Maybe. I'm more interested to see what action they've taken against that infiltration. If there's a League or FIA plant somewhere in Tetsu, or both, I'm guessing someone will have got hands-on with that system somewhere. That's what we can find traces of." Tuo's eyes lit up, nodding fast in comprehension.
"Of course. Can you help us Look?" Earnestly. Sandy blinked, glanced around and found Vanessa standing nearby, watching the small scrum she'd attracted with a vaguely raised eyebrow. Vanessa shrugged offhandedly.
"Sure," she told Tuo. "I'll work on com relays and theft-translations. That has to be how they're using corporate encryption to move around Tanusha." And where she was also, she knew, most likely to find traces of any FIA/League activity in Tanusha itself... personnel traces, active com codes. The means to trace covert people hiding in Tanusha. Possibly. Her heart beat harder at the prospect. "Can you fit me in?"
Tuo grinned. "Only if you can fight your way through all the techs who'll want to meet you." Gave her a slap on her armoured shoulder and left quickly to organise yet more personnel. Sandy looked quizzically at Naidu, uncertain what had just happened. Naidu gave her a rumpled smile.
"Agent Cassidy. Welcome to the CSA."
"Seems weird that the League would be helping their biggest enemies find ways to counter their greatest technological advantage," Singh commented from the back seat of the big government cruiser.
Four SWAT agents sat in full armour, crammed into the cruiser's undersized seating, designed for unarmoured bodies. Seatbelts stretched across powered armourplate. The SWAT flyer in which they'd arrived was unable to make it back to the rooftop pad, which was now crowded with official vehicles. And the media had now surrounded the tower, watching from rooftop vantages and circling aircars and flyers far above the official skylanes, monitoring rooftop traffic through telescopic lenses. There were SWAT experts the media could conceivably contact, a friendly young Intel woman had explained to Sandy, who might count armoured bodies, read personalised helmet markings and wonder who the extra trooper was in SWAT Four. Thus the civilian aircar, which departed from the internal bay midway up the tower's side.