“Do we know why?” Giles asked into the darkness.
Cleavon flicked to another holoscreen. “There was a case that he was a material witness in. The court documents have been sealed, though…”
Giles quickly said, “Get hold of them.”
“But it’s on Ogg,” Cleavon protested.
Giles smiled, the shadows cast from the angle of the holo lights making his face look demonic. “Would that be a problem for a hacking genius?” he asked.
Cleavon looked down at his holo. “No sir. I… I’ll get right on it.”
“Okay, what else do we have?”
It was Soraya’s turn. “I tracked his communications. Managed to get into one of his holos. He has a few burners I think. For the most part, he is using some device that seems to re-route his call signals through various places and servers, but I’ve been able to untangle about 18 percent of his communications since we got his name. He’s been in touch with this institution twice.”
Soraya pulled up a holoscreen with an image of a company. Some kind of family office.
Giles started reading off the site: “Northern Clan of Cambodian.”
He cast his gaze around at the others. “Okay, what do we know about this office?”
Raza injected herself into the show and tell. “Only that they want to maintain the status quo of the Central Systems. In terms of education they make big donations to institutions who have more traditional values. They also have holdings in certain medical facilities, research, pharmaceuticals, not to mention the regulatory bodies of the financial sector.”
Giles stroked his chin as he listened. “Well, this is a red flag if ever there was one. If we can find out why they want to disrupt the university we get closer to finding out what their end game is. And therefore…?”
Soraya answered, needlessly raising her hand excitedly. “What we need to do to protect ourselves or neutralize the threat.”
Giles snapped his fingers and pointed at her. “Exactly. You’re getting it.”
Elroy pipped up from the darkness a little further back. “So… what’s our next move?” he asked.
Rhodez saw his opportunity to demonstrate initiative. “I’ll run down the numbers. If I can get into their holo system, we can find out who else is involved and maybe even narrow this down to an individual in the organization.”
“Great,” Giles replied. “Soraya, you stay on the Sloth holo. Do what you can. It’s all useful data.” He looked out at the outline of the group against the darkness. “And above all else — what’s our rule Number One?”
“No one talks about fight club?” That was Ake, who hadn’t spoken all session.
There were a few smiles and looks of recognition in the room. Clearly some of them had done their research.
Giles smiled. “And rule Number Two?”
“Refer back to rule Number One,” Dhashana piped up enthusiastically from the shadows.
Giles wagged his finger in the direction of her voice in acknowledgment. “Yeah, but this is more important than double scoring rule one. Rule two is - for the love of all that is holy — Don’t. Get. Caught.”
His face was serious as he looked at each of the faces in the storage cupboard - or at least where he thought they were from the dim reflections of holo light. “Not least,” he added, “because it will be my pretty head on the chopping block with the Mollster if anything were to escalate. Capisce?”
There were mutters of comprehension and agreement
“Okay. Great. Class dismissed,” he said as he turned off his flashlight.
Clandestine Operations HQ, Spire
“Ma’am?”
“Yes, Roberts?” Carol Bates strode over to look over her associates shoulder. He had three screens laid out. One large one in the center, and one to each side of him. He pointed to the holoscreen to his left.
“That is the scorecard for our typical efforts,” he told her and she nodded. Effectively, seventy percent effective, twenty percent neutralized and ten percent either blocked or worse, blocked and an effort to trace where it started.
He punched a couple of keys and the screen changed. “This is our effort for this project.”
He didn’t need to point anything out to Carol. Her eyes opened wide when she saw nothing her team had done so far had been effective, twenty percent were neutralized and eighty percent of the attacks had either counter-attacks or all out traces that meant a full-on defense with a massive amount of counter-hacking was going on.
They had kicked over a leergong’s nest.
Shit! Carol stormed towards her office. This was the last thing she needed. She had promised Philip that Molly would never find out.
And now she was about to find out.
And if that weren’t bad enough, she couldn’t decide which was going to be worse, Molly finding out it was her own mother prying into her business, or that she would be thinking she was under attack.
“Ma’am?” Another well-manicured Estarian strode up to her.
“Yes, Wigglesworth?”
“Ma’am, Dr. Bates is here to see you.”
“Fuuuuck,” she muttered under her breath. “Okay, let him through,” she sighed.
“Ma’am, he doesn’t have proper clearance anymore,” he replied.
Carol’s eyes narrowed in surprise. “Yes yes, I’m well aware of that. But do you know who he is?”
Wigglesworth stood a bit straighter, “Yes Ma’am. Only one of the best operatives this office has ever seen.”
“One of? Don’t let him hear you saying that.” Carol answered, a smile on her face, a shake of her head imagining the result of that conversation.
He bowed. “Yes ma’am. I’ll go fetch him now.”
“Thank you, Wigglesworth.”
He disappeared only to return several minutes later with her husband.
“Hello, dear,” Dr. Bates said from the doorway. He nodded to Wigglesworth, who bowed slightly and took his leave.
He glanced over at what was in Carol’s hand, then turned and closed the door. “Thought you’d be needing me right about now,” he said, a little smugness in his voice.
Carol tapped the end of the cigarette on the old fashioned cigarette case. She rummaged in her desk drawer for her lighter and lit up.
Philip sat down in her visitor’s chair. “That bad?” he asked.
She nodded, taking another long drag of the cigarette. She held the smoke in her lungs for several seconds before slowly exhaling into the air ahead of her, watching the smoke disappear into the air conditioning extraction fans. “She’s going to find out,” she said bluntly.
Philip clasped his hands. He nodded his head gently, biding his time until his opinion was asked for.
“We’ve tripped some kind of protocol when we were looking into her Federation links,” Carol added after a moment.
Philip frowned. “So you may have tipped off the Federation. Not Molly.”
“No - if it were a Federation trip wire we wouldn’t have tripped it. We know their signature moves. We would have spotted it,” she said.
Philip remained quiet.
“Anyway, she’s going to find out, or right now she’s running a code red, panicking for no reason.”
Philip had a twinkle in his eye. “I wouldn’t say for no reason.”
Carol looked confused.
“Well, it is Carol Bates who is hunting her down… only the best in the business.” He winked at her.
Carol wasn’t amused. She took another drag of her cigarette, the frustration showing as a tightness around her mouth as she inhaled.
Philip filled the silence this time. “So what’s your play?” he asked.
Her gaze became fixed on a point on the floor of her windowless office. “I don’t know. Yet. Clearly we need another way in.”
Philip smiled. She said ‘we’. He knew immediately what that meant. In that moment he was glad he had taken the gamble and went downtown to drop in on his wife. She was nothing if not predict
able.
At least to him.
“So you need intel about the Federation,” he clarified slowly. “So you need someone who can give you that intel.”
His days as an operative were shining through. Operatives developed assets. Assets were people in this business. And people can tell you anything you needed to know.
He watched her carefully, waiting for her to reveal a tell. “But why would they give you anything?” he probed.
She sighed and pulled her gaze from the floor to look at him. “Because they are meant to be back-door allies?” she posited. “Because it’s my daughter.” Her voice trembled. This had rattled her. He could tell.
He tried another tact. “Have they even admitted that Royale works for them?”
“Nope,” she confirmed. “Not ever in the thirty years since we first encountered him.”
“And yet you’re considering approaching him now.”
“Yes,” she said.
“And what makes you think that he’ll admit anything to you?”
“Because I have evidence of him and their secret ops…”
Philip cut in. “Which he knows you can never use to out him.”
Carol was determined. “And a secret weapon,” she added firmly.
“Oh yeah? What’s that?” he asked, almost impressed.
“Not what… Who,” she corrected him.
Philip’s eyes were bright as he leaned forward in his chair. “Are you going to let me in on it then?”
“No way,” she smiled, regaining her chutzpah. “Not this time. This is need-to-know only, hubby dearest.”
Philip knew there was no point in pressing further. They’d all been taught to withstand all kinds of torture and duress. He uncrossed his legs and got to his feet, zipping up the upper part of his atmosjacket.
“Well then,” he said turning towards the door. “I suppose I’ll see you tonight.”
Carol nodded and waved to him. “Yes dear. But thank you for stopping by. It was good to have someone to talk to.”
Dr. Bates smiled to her. “Any time, my love.” And with that he disappeared out of her office with the same air and grace as he always carried himself around those offices. He was legend amongst the analysts. They all knew that. And he knew it too.
Carol sighed, cigarette still in hand, and started searching her holo for a certain encrypted file she needed for her next move.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Gaitune-67, Kitchen
Molly strode into the kitchen, grabbed a mug and walked to the dispenser for a bit of hot water. She looked over at Paige, who was working at the kitchen table.
“Where’s Maya?”.
Paige looked up, and saw that Molly’s face was a little more blank than usual. “Working on something with Pieter I think. You okay?”
Molly nodded, “Yeah, all good. You?”
Still trying to see if she could get any tells from her boss, Paige said, “Yeah. Just plugging on.”
Molly… we have a problem.
What? What is it?
It seems that someone is still probing, looking for you.
Well it can’t be Bourne, he knows where I am. It must be Lugdon and his team of preppy war hungry imbeciles.
No it’s not Bourne. Or the research facility.
Well who then?
We… don’t know.
Just then, Pieter and Maya came crashing into the kitchen, their faces tense.
“Oz just told me,” Molly explained before they could blurt out what was happening.
She placed her cup down on the table. “What we need to make sure first and foremost is can we shut down their attacks?”
Pieter tilted his head. “Well… they’re not really attacks,” he confessed. “If anything, it’s more that they’re pinging our defenses and trying to test where our vulnerabilities are. They’re looking for intel and to build up a map of our assets. They’re not attacking yet.”
Maya pulled a chair out and plonked herself down at the table. “If anything,” she admitted, “it would be easier to catch them if they were mounting a full on attack. But as it is it’s like trying to catch a ghost.”
Molly leaned against the counter. “Okay, what are our options?” she asked.
“Well,” Pieter began, thinking on his feet. “I think we can probably go back through some data and cross reference any spiders or pings which have hit us with the one that just tripped our protocol. At least then we’ll know that this isn’t just an accidental hit, and with a bit of luck we might be able to build up a picture of what they are targeting.”
Molly nodded her head once. “Okay. Do it.”
She turned to Maya and raised an eyebrow. “I suppose I could reach out to Lugdon and ask him.” Maya answered.
Paige chuckled. “I know, why don’t you call him and ask him out on a date! See if you can pump him for information?”
Maya chuckled, but then realised that Molly was serious. She cleared her throat and returned to the task in hand. “No… erm… seriously, what I was thinking was getting into his computer and seeing if it might have been his team. Once through the firewall, I could poke around and be in and out without him feeling a thing.”
Paige sniggered.
Molly glanced at her and then moved on. “Do it,” she confirmed to Maya.
“Oz?” She called out to the all hearing AI.
“Yup?” He responded on the intercom.
“Any suggestions?”
“Yes, I’ll help them both with the pieces of their suggestions they can’t do without me. I’m sure one of those avenues will show up something.”
“Okay, great. Make it so,” Molly said, smiling encouragement at her team of nerds. She picked up her hot water and strode out of the door.
She hadn’t gone three paces before she heard Maya giggling and chastising Paige for being such a kid in front of the boss.
Molly took a moment and smiled to herself. There was no doubt about it. She was their boss now. And acting like it was good for the team, even if she felt she was missing out on some of the social aspects of being one of the crew.
She sighed and headed back to her conference room knowing one more problem was on her plate, but also being handled by the best team she could ever hope for.
Skóli Uppstigs Academy, Spire, Estaria
The Sark was high in the sky as Professor Giles Kurns strode down the corridor to his first lecture of the day. It had been a good morning: his mocha was just right, he’d had an easy trip into his office, and all was right with the world.
Then he saw Molly Bates, action heroine extraordinaire, most popular lecturer and founder of the university.
Also known as “Boss”.
“Morning!” he called brightly, determined not to let his good mood be spoiled by feelings of inadequacy.
“Morning!” Molly called back, flashing her million-credit smile as she marched from the other end of the corridor towards her classroom, which adjoined his.
She hovered by the door before she went in. Hand on handle, she turned to him as he approached. “All okay since I was away?”
“You were away?” Giles asked, quickly scanning his memory in case there was something he needed since she was right there.
“Yeah. You were going to cover my morning lecture?” she asked.
Dammit. Rumbled. Giles thought.
“Oh right. Yes,” he responded. Had he not had his arms full of books he would have been grabbing for his glasses right now.
Molly narrowed one eye at him. “Giles?” she said in a low voice so that passing students couldn’t hear her. “You didn’t miss it did you?”
Giles straightened up, taking a deep breath to own it. “Yes. Yes I did. But I have a good reason.”
“The smoke bomb incident?” she asked.
“Yes.” He replied.
She pursed her lips. “Hmm, I heard about that from Oz.”
Giles waited for her next words.
“Great work,” she said, f
lashing that smile again.
Giles felt his heart miss a beat… and then his chest swell. “Thank you!” he uttered, his voice catching in his excitement.
“Anything else I should know?” she asked almost too casually.
Giles hesitated, wondering if now was really the best time to be fessing up to using student labor to hunt down the threat to the university, which she also didn’t know about. “Erm. No. Nothing yet. But… let’s catch up over the weekend or something. Have a chat?”
Molly smiled, taking her hand from the door handle to allow a straggler into the class ahead of her. “Okay. Sounds good.”
She moved to catch the door before it swung closed and stepped inside.
“Great!” Giles said as cheerfully as he could. “I’ll see you later. Got to be in class.” He pointed at his classroom door which had been opened by one of the students.
Molly just smiled and let the door shut, disappearing behind the door.
Giles, still reeling from the emotional roller coaster that was the last ten seconds, gathered his thoughts and focused down to the task at hand. He took a deep breath and stepped over the threshold ready to do battle to convince his class that even though he wasn’t hipster Estarian-cool, he was still worth paying attention to.
No sooner was he in front of the class than an applause erupted.
Oh good lord! he exclaimed, placing his teaching materials down on the front bench and looking around the classroom. First, he noticed the windows had been covered, awaiting repair. As he settled into the overwhelming feeling of his class applauding him, he realized why.
Soraya stood up. “Professor Kurns, on behalf of the class I would like to say thank you for keeping us safe from the smoke bombers.” She smiled brightly, and if Giles didn’t know any better he suspected she was perhaps even flirting.
“And for pursuing them after the fact, too.” She winked as another applause rang through the class. Of course, she was publicly referring to giving chase to the bombers.
But privately, she was referring to the little secret society they had going on.
Giles, his hands now free, removed his glasses and started cleaning them again. “Thank you Soraya,” he said graciously, and then nodded regally to the class.
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