Starting the Slowpocalypse (Books 1-3 Omnibus)

by James Litherland

  Anthony kept control of his emotions. “I hope you mean to say it won’t be doing it anymore?”

  “Yes, sir. I halted that program. But the hacker is still out there with whatever program he used.”

  “Can you spell it out a little clearer for me, just what has been happening with these hacks?”

  The boy genius nodded. “The hacker has been calling Crystal’s pad with a regular cell phone—then hijacking the empty connection to try and introduce a virus. Unfortunately, since it’s not a FURCS pad, the system can’t trace the originating cell.”

  “So if I understand you right, we don’t have to worry about any more attacks from Crystal’s pad—but the hacker is still out there and could try again?”

  “If he can get access to another FURCS pad.”

  Anthony looked over Ben’s shoulder then to see Lisa and Susan marching past Hope. We could use some good news about now.

  From the pleased expression on Lisa’s face, she did have something. Anthony looked at Susan and decided he never wanted to play poker with her. Of course neither of them knocked.

  Officer Courdray gave him a curt nod, then cast a questioning glance at Ben.

  “Officer Laskey has made good progress on the hacking investigation. And it proves Crystal was in on it—whatever it is. Which as good as confirms her involvement in the poisoning and gives us a reason for her murder. At least we can infer it.”

  Anthony turned to Ben. “If you can’t locate the ‘originating cell’ can you at least monitor the net for more empty connections? To try and stop any more attempts if our hacker does get their hands on another FURCS pad?”

  The boy smiled. “Yes, sir. I can probably even set up an automated defense based on requiring incoming connections—”

  Anthony cut him off with a wave of his hand. “I don’t need to know the details—just as long as you can get it done.”

  Ben grinned and ran out of the room, and all the way up the stairs by the sound of it.

  Lisa looked at the open door, shaking her head. Then she turned back to her boss. “Wait until you hear what I’ve got for you, Chief.”

  He looked at the clock. “You’d better report.”

  Behind Lisa, Susan was shaking her head in disapproval. At him. “You returned to re-examine the scene of the crime, didn’t you? That’s a good way to get a better grip on a case, but I take it you actually found something new?”

  Lisa’s triumphant smile returned. “I was thinking something must’ve been missed. So Susan and I started with the kitchen with the intention of going over the entire building with a fine-toothed comb—which is what we did. You know the back exit from the kitchen leads to that short corridor?”

  Anthony remembered, and felt a tingle race up his spine. “Yes. It runs right to the hallway going to the back entrance, the one across from the guards’ barracks.”

  “There’s only one door in that short hallway. It’s unmarked and might be taken for a supply closet or something. It was locked, and it seemed no one had a key or knew for sure what it was. So we used our security override to find out.”

  “And?”

  “It’s a kind of back-up pantry with lots of nonperishable food supplies. What was really interesting were the signs someone had been staying there for quite a while. Days, maybe. They’d been eating from the stores there and making quite a mess.”

  “That must’ve been Crystal’s killer. Hiding inside the building after someone had let them in.”

  Lisa nodded. “And whoever it was, they’d been there long enough it didn’t have to be someone with security access who let them in. It could’ve been almost anyone.”

  Anthony sighed. “Including Crystal herself—it probably was her. Anyway, there’s no use trying to track down who let the murderer in—the problem now is finding the killer. And it could be anybody.”

  “You must be tired, sir. Regardless of how the murderer got into the building, how did they know about that little room? And where did they get the key? The answers might help us find that killer.”

  “Alright. There are still important questions to look into. You can do that in the morning. But Officer Mori was here a bit ago with the results from the ballistics tests. It wasn’t one of our weapons. So we’ve got an armed killer on the loose, and that’s a more urgent problem.”

  “Does that mean I can get my gun back, sir?”

  He grinned as he kicked himself mentally. “I’m sorry, Officer Courdray. I asked Michelle to deliver you your weapon at the Guard HQ. You must have missed her. I know you’ve been working late, but I hope you can zip back down there and get your gun so you can have it on you tonight.”

  Lisa’s smile turned grim. “The meeting.”

  “Yes.” He looked at the clock. “I’ll want both of you on call, ready to respond if things get ugly.”

  A loud crack of thunder shook the building, and Susan tilted her head to listen. “No rain yet, but the storm is getting closer. Maybe it’ll help cool people down.”

  Anthony grimaced. “Or put them even more on edge. ‘It was a dark and stormy night’ isn’t a cliché for no reason.”

  “Are you sure you don’t want us to work a little longer? We could stick around for the meeting—it will probably only last a couple of hours.”

  “Thanks for offering, but no. Go home and get some rest—then if you are needed, you’ll be ready. Anyway, I don’t want a visible presence there. Ken Cameron is sending some of his crew to be on hand in case things start getting out of control.”

  Lisa shook her head. “What about Salazar and Gabe? They’re on duty aren’t they?”

  Anthony nodded. “I’m keeping them on patrol, but they’ll be sticking fairly close to the hall and can respond quickly if I send out an alert.”

  “Well, Gabrielle is good and Michael Salazar is certainly able to take care of himself.”

  Anthony sighed again and sat down in the chair behind his desk. He ran his hand through his hair, trying to think. He still had time to get to the meeting, but everything was starting to come together at last—and as worried as he was about Kat, he needed to focus on what had been happening here.

  He looked Lisa straight in the eye. “The murderer set Crystal’s pad to continue making random connections to the FURCSnet, so the virus would be able to keep attacking the system.”

  Lisa squinted. “Presuming Crystal was a part of whatever’s been going on, it is hard to see her programming her pad that way as a final favor for whoever was about to kill her.”

  “And the hacker couldn’t have used her pad for the attacks without her knowledge—so her murder ties Crystal into the hacking and the poisoning both. Giving us a definite conspiracy.”

  Lisa nodded. “We suspected as much. Now we know. The killer could’ve been the hacker him-or-herself or another co-conspirator. Not that it really matters.”

  “Nor does it make any difference at this point if she was killed because she was going to talk, or because they simply had no more use for her.”

  Lisa sighed. “It might matter to David. But for now we should be concerned about who these conspirators are and what their aim is. Sabotage for its own sake? Or a more direct threat we should worry about?”

  Anthony grimaced. “If it’s to a defined purpose, I can only think that it would be to soften us up for an attack on the compound itself.”

  “Indeed. We’ve all worried about that.”

  Anthony stood back up. “It’s clear who’d be behind it too. Governor Roberts may no longer have the resources to overwhelm our defenses, but with so many guards out of action it would be a real fight. And if those hacking attempts succeeded in shutting down our whole system…”

  Lisa continued the thought. “And if that and all the other sabotage threw the community into chaos, they might actually be able to take over.”

  “In which case, they probably have more sabotage planned. But we still don’t know who, or what they might do next, or when an attack from outside could come
. It might be any minute.”

  Lisa and Susan both looked grim. Glancing first at her partner, Lisa turned back to him. “So what do we do now?”

  Anthony shook his head. “Just what I told you. Lisa, go get your gun, and both of you get some rest. Soon every security officer should have their weapons back, or access to them. Everyone will be keeping an eye out for trouble. And I’m going to do what I can to keep people calm at this meeting. Until we know more, there’s not much else to do.”

  Lisa looked him in the eye. “What if they try to do something else like contaminating the wheat?”

  “I’m willing to wager they took advantage of the power outages to get access. And we’ve since made everything a lot more secure.”

  Susan nodded. “And if Ben can prevent further blackouts, everything stays secure.”

  Anthony smiled. “And as far as a direct attack, there can’t be many of these traitors. Two or three at most? If we stay vigilant we’ll be alright.”

  The three of them were standing there, staring at each other when Anthony’s FURCS pad began to buzz against the top of his desk. He snatched it up and saw what he’d been waiting for—not a call, but at least a message from Kat.

  He tried to call her, but her pad was offline. He couldn’t even tell if she’d received the message from him Ben had set to be sent automatically. He could hope she was reading it now.

  Then he scrolled back to read the message she’d sent him, presumably in the same way Ben had programmed Anthony’s own. Kat had pre-written hers like he had, and it was astonishingly short, all things considered. He would’ve liked to ask her for more details but couldn’t.

  Then he pinged the location of her FURCS pad and saw they were getting to the north gate. Looking up at Lisa and Susan, he spoke fast. “We’ve got people coming back in at the north gate, so there is something I want you to do.”

  Anthony would have to skip tonight’s meeting—he had to act now if he was going to help Kat.

  Chapter 15

  Cold Front

  7:35 p.m. Monday, March 3rd

  DAVID stood just inside the doorway and watched as Paul lifted the heavy lid off the giant barrel of rice and Sara took swabs from her testing kit. “Why are you doing that here?”

  Sara gave him an icy stare. “What are you doing here? Haven’t you got guard duties?”

  David shook his head. The lady had quite a chip on her shoulder, and still just an officer trainee. “I was told to keep my eye on this place—this room in particular. Lisa thought there was an off chance the murderer might return to his hidey-hole.”

  “Officer Courdray told us what she’d found, too. And since Chief Nelson ordered us to re-test all the food stores in the building, we have to test what’s in here as well.”

  Paul looked uncomfortable standing next to her and holding the heavy lid in the air. He shrugged at David but said nothing.

  Shifting his eyes back to Sara, David smiled. “I think you’re looking for clues. If the murderer was going to poison something, do you really think he’d poison what he himself had to eat?”

  “Do you really think he’d come back here? That he could if he wanted to? How would he manage to get back into the building? Who’d let him in?”

  David nodded. “Who let him in initially? Perhaps he won’t come back, but he couldn’t know his hiding place has been discovered. Maybe he thinks it’s safe to come back now. And remember, he’s got a gun. And you don’t. I hope you two will be careful.”

  Sara jerked her head at Paul. “I’ve got him, so I don’t need you sticking around to protect me, or to catch the murderer. Should he actually return.”

  David gazed around the cramped room stuffed with supplies and tried to take in every detail. Not just the discarded wrappers on the floor and wads of disposable towels crumpled and piled in the corner, but the upended crates and boxes at odd angles. “A real mess, this. Looks like someone’s been here for weeks.”

  Sara paused as she collected grains of rice into a small sample jar, turning to give him another glare. “Don’t be stupid. No one could’ve been hiding here for weeks—they’d have been missed. We’d have to be searching for them right now. But no one’s missing. We’d know.”

  Tall Paul looked over her head and smiled. “It seems to me that whoever was staying here was just a pig. I agree it’s quite a mess, but that means whoever it was, they weren’t worried about leaving evidence behind.”

  David almost laughed. He’d known some sloppy specimens. Three immediately sprang to mind, and the desire to laugh died. One of those was dead, and the other two were gone—and probably dead.

  He’d learned all he could from looking around this place, anyway. “If you’re sure you don’t want my company, I might as well mosey on. At least, as long as you’re here there’s not much point to keeping a watch out for the killer. I’ll let you catch him if he comes.”

  Sara turned back to her work, ignoring him. So he smiled and waved at Paul and stepped back out into the corridor. Where to now?

  Since he wasn’t on regular guard duty anymore but looking for clues, he ought to go somewhere and do something. But his instructions had been frustratingly vague. Keep your eyes and ears open. David could do that just as easily walking around as he could standing still. Lisa had warned him against thinking too much, but she wasn’t his partner anymore—and Chief Nelson hadn’t said anything about not using his brain. And walking helped David get his mental processes moving.

  Sara was right about one thing. If someone had been gone for even a few days, people would be asking questions. A week or more and Security would have been notified and they’d all have been on the lookout. Just take Officer Miles, now a lieutenant.

  The director’s daughter kept a low profile, and it seemed her parents and her superiors had all been aware that she was outside the compound on a kind of secret mission for the past few days. And people were starting to notice her absence already.

  So if someone had been staying here for several days, even a week or more, they hadn’t been missed yet. David wracked his brain trying to think who it might be, that no one had noticed their absence—or if they had, they hadn’t said anything. Such as another conspirator.

  As he worked his little gray cells, he wandered the halls aimlessly. Another possibility occurred to him—the killer might not have been missed because they didn’t belong in the compound at all. If money and guns had been smuggled in by the original conspirators, they could’ve brought a person in too.

  An intruder would have good reason to remain out of sight completely in that little storeroom. And Lt. Henson or Sgt. Rossiter could’ve easily helped install them there—which would mean they’d been there an awfully long time indeed.

  Remembering those events also recalled to David’s mind the story of how Officer Miles had found the small secured room with the video feed. Which Sgt. Rossiter had apparently used to avoid her. David’s hypothetical intruder might know about that place as well.

  Regardless, if it was someone who had no business being in the FURC, they’d have to hide somewhere. They’d been hiding in that back-up pantry, but they must have used the blackout to slip out of the building before it was searched following Crystal’s murder. But where are they now?

  David tried to put himself in the mindset of this unknown intruder. And had a difficult time coming up with good places inside the compound to hide—not for any length of time, anyway. And this would be a murderer who knew people were searching for him. What would they do?

  They might be able to secrete themselves in the nature park area for a while, as long as they avoided the walkways, but they’d be exposed to the elements out there. And supposedly there was a big storm on its way.

  Susan had warned him about it earlier, but David had been ignoring the distant sound of the whistling wind. Deep inside this brick building he’d no idea how close such a storm might be getting. What he could imagine, though, was an exposed intruder looking for a safe place to sh
elter.

  If, as he’d mentioned to Sara, the killer thought it might be safe to return here to hide, he could try getting back in.

  David considered the options such a hypothetical intruder would have. There were only two ways in or out of the Guard HQ—the main entrance and the back, across from the barracks. The front entrance might not be under constant guard anymore, but it was in constant use. As well as near the offices of Chief Cameron and Lt. Miles and the break room where the guards spent most of the time they were stuck inside the building.

  The back, however, was a different story. Close to both of the small, forgotten rooms the murderer might think he could hide in, and usually only used at change of shift—for the guards and the cafeteria workers. And David well knew that the area was out of view of normal traffic, and obscured from view at night. All the killer would have to do was wait until the shift change was over, then move close enough that he could take advantage of someone going in or out that back door.

  David considered his own options. Shift change had been over an hour ago, and it had already started getting dark with the clouds coming in. If there were an intruder like David hypothesized, he might be in the building now. Or he could be waiting outside that back door.

  If the murderer had made his way back into the building already, David didn’t have to worry about looking for him in that back-up pantry. He’d let his fellow officers Paul and Sara deal with the intruder, if he showed up there. David decided to check out the other little room.

  Turning down one short corridor and then another, he quickly found himself at the dead end he was looking for. If he remembered right, the door on the left was an actual supply closet and the one on the right was the hidden monitoring station. He assumed it would be locked and got out his FURCS pad.

  This morning, to aid his nosing around the HQ, David had received security access to lock and unlock all these doors—this was his first chance to use it. Using his security key to override the lock, David turned the knob and shoved the door open. And he found someone sitting in there.