by D L Young
His old friend didn’t want to bust him. At least not at that moment.
Maddox gestured and his avatar sped away from the DS’s central cluster, backtracking the path he’d taken moments before. Seconds later he reached the limit of the outermost security perimeter and raced beyond it, still unseen. Safely beyond detection, he watched the status bar disappear as it stopped at two percent.
He hovered there in the ether, his motionless avatar a pinpoint of dull yellow light in an unending virtual universe. He tried to wrap his thoughts around the last few minutes. Had that really just happened? It seemed too insane to believe. Naz Gideon a cop. Here in VS with him.
Maddox knew he should probably unplug. Peel the trodes off his head, break the connection, and figure out the next move once his head stopped spinning.
The cave could be a trap. Likely was a trap. But then Gideon could have easily trapped him just now in the DS, and he hadn’t. Instead, his old acquaintance had simply tapped him on the shoulder.
No small part of Maddox wanted to unplug and catch his breath, knowing that was the prudent move. But however powerful the urge to unplug was, it was diminished by his desperation to unravel the mystery of the mess he was in.
Gideon. Gideon had to have the answers.
Maddox felt his meat sack back in the room take in a deep breath. All right, then. The cave.
10 - The Cave
Maddox couldn’t believe it still existed, but here it was. And here he was, swimming through it.
He raced along the shallow seafloor like a sentient missile, navigating the lesser-known paths through the coral reef as much by memory as sight or his sense of echolocation. The sea was a clear, perfect blue, and from the surface ten meters above his head, dappled sunlight shone down, covering the reef’s colorful nodes with a mottled glow. A school of fish, shimmering like a thousand pieces of silver, darted out of his way, exploding out of their tight formation to let him pass through. He recalled how hard it was to catch those little suckers.
When was the last time he’d been a dolphin? Fifteen years ago? More?
The game was called Mantis, and it had been a huge hit back when Maddox had still cared about such diversions. Accessed through specialized gaming specs—or as Maddox was now, through a ported connection to his VS deck—the game put you in the skin of whatever marine life struck your fancy. Killer whale, sea lion, barracuda, tiger shark. Maddox had always preferred the bottlenose dolphin. He’d loved using echolocation, the sound-based sense used by real dolphins and whales for navigation, orientation, even long-distance communication. It was like seeing without eyes, a sensory experience that was impossible to explain to anyone who hadn’t played the game.
Mantis had also been his first major datajack. His and Gideon’s. The teens had played the game together for countless hours on stolen accounts, fascinated by the environment, a single-instance virtual universe that accurately modeled the breadth and depth of the planet’s oceans, less the enormous churning islands of plastic and trash, of course. Together they’d studied leaked source code, uncovering exploits and vulnerabilities. At first they’d used their cheats to level up their aquatic avatars, endowing them with abilities the game designers had never included. Maddox’s dolphin could swim at the speed of sound or, if he was in a real rush to get somewhere, teleport. Gideon’s mako shark had steel skin and eye lasers.
Later they’d created a secret, untraceable, tightly encrypted location in the game, a cave beneath their favorite reef off the South Pacific coast of New Caledonia. In his old customized avatar, Maddox could have just teleported to the location, but that player account was long gone, auctioned off to some hardcore gamer way back when. In this freeplay skin, he had to get there the old-fashioned way, making the ten-minute swim from a default entry point. The time gave him a chance to gather his thoughts. Or try to, anyway. As he swam along the familiar channels, he still couldn’t quite grasp the trajectory of his last couple hours.
Gideon. Their shared history flashed through Maddox’s mind as he glided through the warm, sunlit shallows. As teens, the two had first met in Mantis, in these very same virtual waters. And here they’d both been noticed by Rooney, who’d often scouted the gaming feeds for new talent. He’d spotted their rather obvious hacks (teleporting dolphins and steel-skinned sharks were hard to miss in a game that marketed itself as a realistic simulation) and recruited them for his crew. Years later, Maddox had learned his discovery by Rooney had been anything but coincidental. The invisible hand of a now-deceased artificial intelligence had manipulated their lives, making sure Rooney’s and his paths had converged to serve its own secret agenda. Maddox pushed those thoughts away, focusing instead on the early days when he and Gideon had first trained as datajackers.
Under Rooney’s tutelage, the two learned the ins and outs of core-level virtual space. For the majority of novices, it was an extraordinarily difficult undertaking. The environment required laser-focused concentration and strained the average human brain to the limits of its sensory and cognitive capabilities. Navigating core-level VS was something few could learn, even fewer could master.
Of the two youths, Maddox proved to be the quicker study, becoming Rooney’s star pupil, blessed with a preternaturally gifted mind that took to VS like the proverbial fish to water. And while Gideon lacked the other’s talent, he bridged the gap with stubborn, single-minded perseverance, slowly but doggedly grinding his way along the learning curve. Where Maddox succeeded on his first run inside a test environment, Gideon failed a dozen times before finally getting it right. The gap in their respective talents soon proved to be a wedge in their friendship, and what began as a friendly rivalry as gamers deteriorated into a not-so-friendly one as newbie criminals.
About a year into their datajacker careers, Gideon suddenly left Rooney’s crew. There one day and gone the next, he disappeared without a word to anyone. And over the nearly two decades since, Maddox had never heard of him again…until today.
He rounded a familiar outcropping of coral, then stopped suddenly as he realized he’d arrived at his destination. Before him was the cave, its small darkened entrance on the seabed between two towering sections of reef. He paused for a few moments. What exactly waited for him down there? Nothing good. He was certain of that much. By the time Gideon had ghosted Rooney’s crew, he and Maddox had long since fallen out. Gideon had hated him back then and probably still hated him now. Maddox steeled himself, ready to unplug at any sign of a trap.
He pointed his snout to the cave opening and with a downward sweep of his muscled tail, thrust forward into the darkness…
…and landed on two human feet in the soft sand of the air-filled cave. He checked his avatar, amazed to find the automatic skin switch still worked. His avatar was a fairly accurate replica of his own flesh-and-blood body, dressed in the drab default shirt and trousers the game clothed him in. He looked up at the cave’s entrance above his head, the gravity-defying water rippling across it. Incredible, he thought. Their virtual place had survived who knew how many upgrades without getting wiped. Not a bad piece of coding, he mused.
“You’re late.”
Maddox turned. Gideon stood in a darkened recess at the opposite side of the cave. He stepped out of the shadow into the light filtering down through the water, his gaming skin outfitted in a perfectly tailored suit.
“Can’t believe I remembered how to get here,” Maddox said. Then, glancing around: “Can’t believe this game is still around.”
“The community isn’t what it used to be,” Gideon said, stepping forward. “I suppose enough players hung on to their subscriptions to keep things going.”
“You still play?”
“Every now and then. To blow off steam.”
“So you’re a cop now,” Maddox said, shifting topics. “How did that happen?”
“I turned my life around, Blackburn. People change, you know.”
“Yeah, I’ve heard about that,” Maddox said. “You find God, too?”
Gideon chuckled. “Not quite.”
“How did you find me?”
“Wasn’t easy. I had to use just about every trick the old man taught me.”
“And how did you know I was in your DS just now?”
Gideon suppressed a grin. “I figured at some point you’d hear my name, want to check my file for yourself. So I put a traffic monitor in the personnel archive, had it ping me if it saw any ripples in the water, so to speak.”
Maddox nodded stiffly. “Not bad.”
“Thanks.”
“So what the hell’s going on, Naz?” Maddox asked pointedly. “Why did you want to come here?”
Gideon’s mouth tightened into a straight line. “I’m afraid you’re in a lot of trouble, Blackburn.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Maddox said. “I didn’t have anything to do with that bombing over at T-Chen, and you know it.”
“Really?” Gideon challenged, lifting his chin skeptically. “So you’re saying you weren’t jacking T-Chen’s DS on the very same day their building was bombed?”
Maddox didn’t answer.
“And those biker kids we picked up,” Gideon continued. “You’re telling me they’re not associates of yours?” He shook his head ruefully. “It doesn’t look very good for you right now. Those punks are pretty close to making a confession.”
“I bet they are,” Maddox said. “How many more shocks you think it’ll take?”
“Hard to say,” Gideon responded without hesitation. “But they’ll get there. And something tells me when they do, one Blackburn Maddox is going to be named as the mastermind behind it all.”
Maddox swallowed hard. He was screwed. So very, very screwed.
“You’re setting me up,” he accused.
“I’m setting you up,” Gideon admitted without hesitation, without shame. It was a proud, arrogant reply. He was telling Maddox I’m a cop and I’m breaking the law and big fucking deal.
“Care to tell me why?” Maddox asked.
“Because I can, first of all. Christ, Blackburn, you’d be amazed at what you can get away with when you’re a cop. But mostly it’s because I want to.”
Because he wanted to. So that was what this was? Bad blood? An ancient grudge from when they were kids? It was hard to swallow. “A frame-up with fourteen dead bodies. It’s a bit overkill for some payback on teenage bullshit, don’t you think?”
“Nobody was supposed to get hurt in the bombing. My bad, I guess.”
Maddox felt a surge of dread at the lieutenant’s casual indifference. What had happened to this man in the years since Maddox had known him that he could shrug off mass murder like some unimportant mishap? Like a ground car’s flat tire or an app that crashed in your lenses?
“Nothing ever goes to plan, does it?” Maddox said.
“It’s what the old man taught us, right?”
“Yeah, he did.” Maddox flicked his wrist and a lit cigarette appear in his hand. The old trick he’d modded still worked, he was relieved to see. He needed a smoke in the worst way.
Maddox inhaled deeply, his mind whirling, at once amazed, troubled, and baffled at the lengths the man had gone to.
“Even without the body count,” he said, thinking aloud, “I still don’t get it. You’ve got the whole world in your hands. Why screw that up over little old me? Why go to so much trouble?”
Gideon reached out and touched the cave wall, ran his finger down its moist surface. “Do you remember,” he said after a while, “when we got busted and sent to youth detention?”
Maddox remembered. The pair had been arrested trying to market some stolen wares. Through an undercover cop posing as a dealer, as it turned out.
“Sure, I remember,” Maddox answered. The overcrowded, understaffed detention facility had been a horrific experience, each day a scrambling, bloody fight for survival.
“Then you probably remember how the old man worked liked crazy to get your time reduced. Called in favors. Made payoffs. Got you out in three months, didn’t he? But not me. No, he let me rot in there for a year and a half. Eighteen months in that hellhole. He didn’t lift a damn finger to get me out of there.”
“That’s not true,” Maddox argued. “It made him sick that you were in there. I saw it on his face every day. He tried to get you out.”
“Sure he did. I bet he tried just as hard as he did with you, didn’t he?” He laughed without humor in it. “You know, that time inside taught me some things.”
“Like what?”
“Like some people are special. They’re born with good looks, or rich parents, or maybe a special talent for datajacking. Those people get treated differently. Doors magically open for them. They get the benefit of every doubt. They get the best jobs, the hottest women. They get their sentences shortened while others stay locked up. They get the best gigs served up on a plate, while others have to fight like street dogs for whatever they can get.”
Gideon stepped forward. Maddox felt the long-simmering hatred like heat from an open oven. It leaked from Gideon’s avatar like radiation.
“I promised myself a long time ago I’d show you up once and for all, and now I’m finally in a place where I can make it happen.” He paused. “And, no, it’s not a lot of trouble, Blackburn. Not at all.” A demon’s smile touched the lieutenant’s face. “You’re special, after all. You’re worth the trouble.”
Maddox smoked. “So you brought me here to gloat,” he said. “You in your designer suit and me in this thrift shop outfit.”
Gideon spread his hands out wide. “A little petty, I admit, but then the best pleasures in life sometimes are. I’ve been looking forward to this moment for a long time.”
“And is it everything you imagined it would be?”
“Oh, yes. And so much more.”
The lieutenant’s face held the smug satisfaction Maddox had seen a thousand times on the faces of power-tripping cops, highfloor corporati, and underworld crime bosses. It was a look the powerful gave to the powerless. But more than a look, it was an attitude, a warped mindset of those in power who enjoyed ruining lives. Who got off on the suffering of others, especially the helpless and vulnerable.
Maddox took a long draw on his cigarette, smoke filling his lungs. He held the breath for an extended moment before blowing out slowly.
“You know, I was thinking about your career on the way over here,” he said. “Thinking about your amazing rise through the ranks. And you know something? It didn’t add up.”
Gideon appeared amused. “Really? How so?”
“I mean, even for someone as cutthroat as you, making lieutenant before forty? You’re barely thirty, same as me. So I was wondering what the hell’s the secret sauce here? What does a second-rate datajacker have that got him ahead so quickly?” Maddox gave a mock-surprise look. “And then I realized that was it. Jacking. That’s what makes you different.”
Gideon’s expression darkened at the second-rate comment, a reaction Maddox took a small pleasure in.
“So how’d you go about it?” Maddox asked. “You get dirt on your bosses? Dupe their spec feeds when they went to see their mistresses, then blackmail them to bump you up a couple job levels? Or did you fabricate evidence for the higher-ups, digital fingerprints and such, so prosecutors could get some easy convictions on big cases? Christ, you must have been a godsend for some of the old crooks in that precinct building. Of course it was datajacking. That’s the only thing that explains it. Because if it were about brains and talent, your career would have peaked at traffic cop.”
For a long moment no one spoke. “Same old Blackburn,” Gideon finally said through gritted teeth. “Still the smart guy. Still putting together those connections no one else can. Give the man a couple pieces of the puzzle, and he can tell you what the whole damn thing looks like.”
“It’s a gift,” Maddox said, returning smug with smug.
Gideon’s hands clenched into fists. “And you still have that smart mouth, don’t y
ou? Let’s see smart you are with a shockstick up your ass.”
“You’re never going to get that close to me, you crazy son of a bitch.” He took a last drag, dropped his cigarette to the sandy floor of the cave, and unplugged.
11 - Going Away Party
When the room materialized around Maddox, he found Tommy and Jack leaning forward on the sofa, gazing at him with expectant looks on their faces.
“Well?” Jack asked. “You find what you were looking for?”
And then some, Maddox reflected darkly. He looked around the room with a newfound paranoia. Even though he knew the place was free of listening devices, he still couldn’t shake the notion someone might be listening.
“Outside,” he said.
The trio stepped through the window onto the fire escape landing, and in the hazy, falling light of early evening, Maddox dropped it on them. After scanning the street for cams and drones and finding none, in hushed tones he told them what had had happened while he was plugged in. What he’d found out and who he’d spoken to.
“Damn, Blackburn,” Jack said, whistling in disbelief. “That’s one hell of a target you got on your back.”
“Yeah, it is,” Maddox agreed grimly. A target on his back every cop and street cam and bumblebee drone in the City would be hunting for, probably were already. Standing there in the open air of the fire escape landing, he felt conspicuous and vulnerable, despite the deserted, quiet street below them.
“You got to fight back,” Tommy said. “You can’t let him get away with it.”
“Kid,” Maddox said tiredly, “he’s already gotten away with it.”
“But he’s a crook,” the kid protested.
“Which makes him no different than any other cop,” Maddox said. “Except he’s better at it than most.”
“You can plug in,” the kid pleaded, “find some dirt on him or something, can’t you? You say he’s been jacking all this time. Maybe find a trail he left behind somewhere.”
