Jon Holloway had looked at life and decided that God and his parents had fucked him up so much that the only way he could survive was to see it as a MUD game.
And he was now playing again.
Who do you want to be?
In the basement of his pleasant suburban house in Los Altos Phate washed the blood off his Ka-bar knife and began sharpening it, enjoying the hiss of the blade against the sharpening steel he’d bought at Williams-Sonoma.
This was the same knife he’d used to tease to stillness the heart of an important character in the game—Andy Anderson.
Hiss, hiss, hiss . . .
Access . . .
As he swiped the knife against the steel Phate’s perfect memory recalled a passage from the article “Life in the Blue Nowhere,” which he’d copied into one of his hacking notebooks several years ago:
The line between the real world and the machine world is becoming more and more blurred every day. But it’s not that humans are turning into automatons or becoming slaves to machines. No, we’re simply growing toward each other. In the Blue Nowhere, machines are taking on our personalities and culture—our language, myths, metaphors, philosophy and spirit.
And those personalities and cultures are in turn being modified more and more by the Machine World itself.
Think about the loner who used to return home from work and spend the night eating junk food and watching TV all night. Now, he turns on his computer and enters the Blue Nowhere, a place where he interacts—he has tactile stimulation on the keyboard, verbal exchanges, he’s challenged. He can’t be passive anymore. He has to provide input to get some response. He’s entered a higher level of existence and the reason is that machines have come to him. They speak his language.
For good or bad, machines now reflect human voices, spirits, hearts and goals.
For good or bad, they reflect human conscience, or the lack of conscience too.
Phate finished honing the blade and wiped it clean. He replaced it in his footlocker and returned upstairs to find that his taxpayer dollars had been well spent; the Defense Research Center’s supercomputers had just finished running Jamie Turner’s program and had spit out the passcode to St. Francis Academy’s gates. He was going to get to play his game tonight.
For good or bad . . .
After twenty minutes of poring over the printouts from Gillette’s search the team could find no other leads. The hacker sat down at a workstation to write code for the bot that would continue to search the Net for him.
Then he paused and looked up. “There’s one thing we have to do. Sooner or later Phate’s going to realize that you’ve got a hacker looking for him and he might try to come after us.” He turned to Stephen Miller. “What external networks do you have access to from here?”
“Two—the Internet, through our own domain: cspccu.gov. That’s the one you’ve been using to get online. Then we’re also hooked to ISLEnet.”
Sanchez explained the acronym. “That’s the Integrated Statewide Law Enforcement Network.”
“Is it quarantined?”
A quarantined network was made up of machines connected only to one another and only by hardwire cables—no one could hack in via a phone line or the Internet.
“No,” Miller said. “You can log on from anywhere—but you need passcodes and have to get through a couple of firewalls.”
“What outside networks could I get to from ISLEnet?”
Sanchez shrugged. “Any state or federal police system around the country—the FBI, Secret Service, ATF, NYPD . . . even Scotland Yard and Interpol. The works.”
Mott added, “Since we’re a clearinghouse for all computer crimes in the state, the CCU has root authority on ISLEnet. So we have access to more machines than anybody else.”
Gillette said, “Then we’ll have to cut our links to it.”
“Hey, hey, hey, backspace, backspace,” Miller said, using the hacker term for hold on a minute. “Cut the link to ISLEnet? We can’t do that.”
“We have to.”
“Why?” Bishop asked.
“Because if Phate gets inside them with a Trapdoor demon he could jump right to ISLEnet. If he does that he’ll have access to every law enforcement network it’s connected to. It’d be a disaster.”
“But we use ISLEnet a dozen times a day,” Shelton protested. “The automatic fingerprint identification databases, warrants, suspect records, case files, research. . . .”
“Wyatt’s right,” Patricia Nolan said. “Remember that this guy’s already cracked VICAP and two state police databases. We can’t risk him getting into any other systems.”
Gillette said, “If you need to use ISLEnet you’ll have to go to some other location—headquarters, or wherever.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Stephen Miller said. “We can’t drive five miles to log on to a database. It’ll add hours to the investigation.”
“We’re already swimming upstream here,” Shelton said. “This perp is way ahead of us. He doesn’t need any more advantages.” He glanced at Bishop imploringly.
The lean detective glanced down at his sloppy shirttail and tucked it in. After a moment he said, “Go ahead. Do what he says. Cut the connection.”
Sanchez sighed.
Gillette quickly keyed in the commands severing the outside links as Stephen Miller and Tony Mott looked on unhappily. He also renamed the CCU domain caltourism.gov to make it much harder for Phate to track them down and crack their system. When he finished the job he looked up at the team.
“One more thing. . . . From now on nobody goes online but me.”
“Why?” Shelton asked.
“Because I can sense if the Trapdoor demon’s in our system.”
“How?” the rough-faced cop asked sourly. “Psychic Friends’ Hotline?”
Gillette answered evenly, “The feel of the keyboard, the delays in the system’s responses, the sounds of the hard drive—what I mentioned before.”
Shelton shook his head. He asked Bishop, “You’re not going to agree to that, are you? First, we weren’t supposed to let him get near the Net at all but he ended up roaming all over the fucking world online. Now, he’s telling us that he’s the only one who can do that and we can’t. That’s backwards, Frank. Something’s going on here.”
“What’s going on,” Gillette argued, “is that I know what I’m doing. When you’re a hacker you get the feel for machines.”
“Agreed,” Bishop said.
Shelton lifted his arms helplessly. Stephen Miller didn’t look any happier. Tony Mott caressed the grip of his big gun and seemed to be thinking less about machines and more about how much he wanted a clear shot at the killer.
Bishop’s phone rang and he took the call. He listened for a moment and, while he didn’t exactly smile, the cop’s face grew animated. He picked up a pen and paper and started taking notes. After five minutes of jotting he hung up and glanced at the team.
“We don’t have to call him Phate anymore. We’ve got his name.”
CHAPTER 00001101 / THIRTEEN
“Jon Patrick Holloway.”
“It’s Holloway?” Patricia Nolan’s voice rose in surprise.
“You know him?” Bishop asked.
“Oh, you bet. Most of us in computer security do. But nobody’s heard from him in years. I thought he’d gone legit or was dead.”
Bishop said to Gillette, “It was thanks to you we found him—that suggestion about the East Coast version of Unix. The Massachusetts State Police had positive matches on the prints.” Bishop read his notes. “I’ve got a little history. He’s twenty-seven. Born in New Jersey. Parents and only sibling—a brother—are dead. He went to Rutgers and Princeton, good grades, brilliant computer programmer. Popular on campus, involved in a lot of activities. After he graduated he came out here and got a job at Sun Microsystems doing artificial intelligence and supercomputing research. Left there and went to NEC. Then he went to work for Apple, over in Cupertino. A year later he was back on the
East Coast, doing advanced phone-switch design—whatever that is—at Western Electric in New Jersey. Then he got a job with Harvard’s Computer Science Lab. Looks like he was pretty much your perfect employee—team player, United Way campaign captain, things like that.”
“Typical upper-middle-class codeslinger/chip-jockey,” Mott summarized.
Bishop nodded. “Except there was one problem. All the while he looked like he was Mr. Upstanding Citizen he’d been hacking at night and running cybergangs. The most famous was the Knights of Access. He founded that with another hacker, somebody named Valleyman. No record of his real name.”
“The KOA?” Miller said, troubled. “They were bad news. They took on Masters of Evil—that gang from Austin. And the Deceptors in New York. He cracked both gangs’ servers and sent their files to the FBI’s Manhattan office. Got half of them arrested.”
“The Knights were also probably the gang that shut down nine-one-one in Oakland for two days.” Looking through his notes, Bishop said, “A few people died because of that—medical emergencies that never got reported. But the D.A. could never prove they did it.”
“Pricks,” Shelton spat out.
Bishop continued, “Holloway didn’t go by Phate then. His username was CertainDeath.” He asked Gillette, “Do you know him?”
“Not personally. But I’ve heard of him. Every hacker has. He was at the top of the list of wizards a few years ago.”
Bishop returned to his notes.
“Somebody snitched on him when he was working for Harvard and the Massachusetts State Police paid him a visit. His whole life turned out to be fake. He’d been ripping off software and supercomputer parts from Harvard and selling them. The police checked with Western Electric, Sun, NEC—all his other employers—and it seemed he’d been doing the same thing there. He jumped bail in Massachusetts and nobody’s seen or heard from him for three or four years.”
Mott said, “Let’s get the files from the Mass. State Police. There’s bound to be some good forensics in there that we can use.”
“They’re gone,” Bishop replied.
“He destroyed those files too?” Linda Sanchez asked grimly.
“What else?” Bishop replied sarcastically then glanced at Gillette. “Can you change that bot of yours—the search program? And add the names Holloway and Valleyman?”
“Piece of cake.” Gillette began keying in code once more.
Bishop called Huerto Ramirez and spoke to him for a few moments. When they hung up he said to the team, “Huerto said there’re no leads from the Anderson crime scene. He’s going to run the name Jon Patrick Holloway through VICAP and state networks.”
“Be faster to just use ISLEnet here,” Stephen Miller muttered.
Bishop ignored the dig and continued, “Then he’s going to get a copy of Holloway’s booking picture from Massachusetts. He and Tim Morgan are going to leave some pictures around Mountain View, near the theatrical supply store, in case Phate goes shopping. Then they’ll call all the employers Phate used to work for and get any internal reports on the crimes.”
“Assuming they haven’t been deleted too,” Sanchez muttered pessimistically.
Bishop looked up at the clock. It was nearly 4:00. He shook his head. “We’ve gotta move. If his goal is killing as many people as he can in a week he might already have somebody else targeted.” He picked up a marker and began transcribing his handwritten notes on the white-board.
Patricia Nolan nodded at the board, where the word “Trapdoor” was prominently written in black marker. She said, “That’s the crime of the new century. Violation.”
“Violation?”
“In the twentieth century people stole your money. Now, what gets stolen is your privacy, your secrets, your fantasies.”
Access is God. . . .
“But on one level,” Gillette reflected, “you’ve got to admit that Trapdoor’s brilliant. It’s a totally robust program.”
A voice behind him asked angrily, “‘Robust’? What does that mean?” Gillette wasn’t surprised to find that the questioner was Bob Shelton.
“I mean it’s simple and powerful software.”
“Jesus,” Shelton said. “It sounds like you wish you’d invented the fucking thing.”
Gillette said evenly, “It’s an astonishing program. I don’t understand how it works and I’d like to. That’s all. I’m curious about it.”
“Curious? You happen to forget a little matter like he’s killing people with it.”
“I—”
“You asshole. . . . It’s a game to you too, isn’t it? Just like him.” He stalked out of CCU, calling to Bishop, “Let’s get the hell out of here and find that witness. That’s how we’re going to nail this prick. Not with this computer shit.” He stormed off.
No one moved for a moment. The team looked awkwardly at the white-board or computer terminals or the floor.
Bishop nodded for Gillette to follow him into the pantry, where the detective poured some coffee into a Styrofoam cup.
“Jennie, that’s my wife, keeps me rationed,” Bishop said, glancing at the dark brew. “Love the stuff but I’ve got gut problems. Pre-ulcer, the doctor says. Is that a crazy way to put it, or what? Sounds like I’m in training.”
“I’ve got reflux,” Gillette said. He touched his upper chest. “Lot of hackers do. From all the coffee and soda.”
“Look, about Bob Shelton . . . He had a thing happen a few years ago.” The detective sipped the coffee, glanced down at his blossoming shirt. He tucked it in yet again. “I read those letters in your court file—the e-mails your father sent to the judge as part of the sentencing hearing. It sounds like you two have a good relationship.”
“Real good, yeah,” Gillette said, nodding. “Especially after my mom passed away.”
“Well, then I think you’ll understand this. Bob had a son.”
Had?
“He loved the kid a lot—like your dad loves you, sounds like. Only the kid was killed in a car accident a few years ago. He was sixteen. Bob hasn’t been the same since then. I know it’s a lot to ask but try to cut him some slack.”
“I’m sorry about that.” Gillette thought suddenly about his own ex-wife. How he’d spent hours and hours in prison wishing he were still married, wishing that he and Ellie had had a son or daughter, wondering how the hell he’d screwed up so badly and ruined his chances for a family. “I’ll try.”
“Appreciate that.”
They walked back to the main room. Gillette returned to his workstation. Bishop nodded toward the parking lot. “Bob and I’ll be checking out that witness at Vesta’s Grill.”
“Detective,” Tony Mott said, standing up. “How ’bout if I come along with you?”
“Why?” Bishop asked, frowning.
“Thought I could help—you’ve got the computer side covered here, with Wyatt and Patricia and Stephen. I could help canvassing witnesses maybe.”
“You ever do any canvassing?”
“Sure.” After a few seconds he grinned. “Well, not post-crime on the street exactly. But I’ve interviewed plenty of people online.”
“Well, maybe later, Tony. I think Bob and I’ll run this one alone.” He left the office.
The young cop returned to his workstation, clearly disappointed. Gillette wondered if he was upset that he’d been left to report to a civilian or if he really wanted to get a chance to use that very large pistol of his, the butt of which kept nicking the office furniture.
In five minutes he’d finished hacking together his bot.
“It’s ready,” he announced. He went online and typed the commands to send his creation out into the Blue Nowhere.
Patricia Nolan leaned forward, staring at the screen. “Good luck,” she whispered. “Godspeed.” Like a ship captain’s wife bidding her husband farewell as his vessel pulled out of port on a treacherous voyage to uncharted waters.
Another beep on his machine.
Phate looked up from the architectural diag
ram he’d downloaded—St. Francis Academy and the grounds surrounding it—and saw another message from Shawn. He opened the mail and read it. More bad news. The police had learned his real name. He was momentarily concerned but then decided this wasn’t critical; Jon Patrick Holloway was hidden beneath so many layers of fake personas and addresses that there were no links to him as Phate. Still, the police could get their hands on a picture of him (some parts of our past can’t be erased with a delete command) and they’d undoubtedly distribute it throughout Silicon Valley. But at least he was now forewarned. He’d use more disguises.
Anyway, what was the point of playing a MUD game if it wasn’t challenging?
He glanced at the clock on his computer: 4:15. Time to get to St. Francis Academy for tonight’s game. He had over two hours but he’d have to stake out the school to see if the patrol routes of the security guards had changed. Besides, he knew little Jamie Turner might be feeling antsy and want to slip out of the school before the appointed hour for a stroll around the block while he waited for his brother.
Phate walked down to the basement of his house and took what he needed from his footlocker—his knife, a pistol, some duct tape. Then he went into the downstairs bathroom and pulled a plastic bottle from under the sink. It contained some liquids he’d mixed together earlier. He could still detect the pungent aroma of the chemicals it contained.
He returned to the dining room of his house and checked the computer once more. But there were no messages. He logged off and left the room, shutting out the overhead light in the dining room.
As he did so the screen saver on his computer came on and glowed brightly in the dim room. The words scrolled up the screen slowly. They read:
ACCESS IS GOD.
CHAPTER 00001110 / FOURTEEN
“Here, brought you this.”
Gillette turned. Patricia Nolan was offering him a cup of coffee. “Milk and sugar, right?”
He nodded. “Thanks.”
“I noticed that’s how you like it,” she said.
The Blue Nowhere: A Novel Page 12
