part0019

She glanced from one to the other of Masada Station’s skeleton crew. They were in the War Room, what they’d come to call the station’s nerve center. Bekah’s tech team was taking shifts monitoring Cassandra’s constant, relentless cyberattacks against Titan. Only four—Bekah, Carrin, Daniel, and Maya Breides—were awake. Aisha Alvi and Noa Comar were asleep in their quarters.

“They’re actually tightbeaming worms over CorpNet,” Carrin said, her voice open with admiration. “They’re propagating across the Labyrinth… I mean, I can’t even keep up.”

She also sounded frightened.

The corner of Bekah’s mouth ticked up anyway. Every time she heard the name of Titan’s decoy database—Gregor Erkennen’s morbid sense of humor at work—it made her want to laugh: the Labyrinth! Opa Simon would have approved. A callback to Greek mythology and the maze built by King Minos to trap the Minotaur in a perpetual loop of confusing pathways. Loops and pathways , she thought, smiling at how appropriate those terms were for the cyber snipe hunt they’d set Cassandra on. Billions of worms tunneling through the Labyrinth, delivering their exfiltration payloads and snatching yottabytes of corporate data. Information gold, mined from the veins of the Erkennen Faction’s genius.

“But all they’re getting is pyrite,” Bekah said out loud.

Eugene Fischer sat at an empty workstation, hands behind his head, feet on the console. Simon Franklin would have admonished him to put his feet down, to show a little respect as a guest. But she wasn’t her opa. And Fischer wasn’t someone she was comfortable being around, much less giving an etiquette lesson to. For hours she’d sat here with her shift mates and Fischer, observing the attacks on the Labyrinth and marveling at the tag-team defenders of Erkennen and Zafar and the other defenders at Prometheus Colony. Sometimes they were able to fend off the attacks; sometimes they weren’t. But every seeming victory for Cassandra was an actual victory for SynCorp. Every prize the attacks took was no prize at all. Just a collection of empty code, false test results, and flawed schematics.

“Nothing,” she said.

“No, you said something,” Fischer said, curious. His feet came down as he sat forward. In her mind, Bekah nodded to her grandfather’s spirit, as if invoking his memory had somehow influenced the old man to demonstrate some couth. “Something about pirates?”

Bekah’s grin came spiced with indulgence. “Pyrite . As in iron pyrite. Fool’s gold. It’s what—”

“I know what it is,” Fischer said. “I was making a joke.”

“Seriously, Bekah, I don’t know how Rahim is doing it,” Carrin said. “The SSR worms have zombied the whole system, or damn near all of it. I don’t see how he’s walling off his own response code.”

“Zombied?” Fischer asked.

Bekah’s tight expression returned. “It’s when—”

“Never mind,” he said, waving a hand. “I don’t need to understand.”

“He’s not in the system.”

Everyone turned to look at Daniel Tripp.

“Rahim’s not in the system,” Daniel continued. “He can’t be. Cassandra’s AI reaction response is too fast for any human to keep up with.”

“Go team,” Fischer said flatly.

“What I mean is,” Daniel said, throwing a nervous glance the enforcer’s way, “Rahim and I discussed the defense strategy before he left. The algorithms he and the regent programmed set up millions of fake techs, right? The castles with the Holy Grails in them. Only, instead of spikes in the moat to impale attackers who fall in, there are code bombs hidden to blow up infiltrator worms.”

Bekah gave him a look. “Go on, Daniel.”

“Any time a data exfiltration request hits one of the bombs, it puts up the most vigorous defense it can against the breach attempt. Never good enough, of course, in the long run. Cassandra can outthink it. But that takes time, and there are millions of those defenses that have to be overcome.”

“But eventually those will run out, right?” Fischer said.

“No,” Carrin said. Daniel had been about to answer, but she put up a hand. “This is how I’d do it. I’d use a botnet that only connects to the Labyrinth at random times and downloads no data, not a single packet—it only uploads random algorithms to generate new castles around new fake tech grails. And I’d use—”

“—adaptive heuristics to keep Cassandra on her toes,” Daniel finished. He turned to Bekah with an I-told-you-so look on his face. “That’s exactly what he’s doing.”

“Wow,” Fischer said. “How do you people ever get laid?”

Bekah turned to him. “Mr. Fischer, what Rahim is doing on Titan is protecting the entire Company by protecting Masada’s mainframe from attack. You realize that, right?”

Fischer’s eyebrows went up. “More or less,” he said, holding her gaze.

The data readout on Carrin’s screen chittered, monitoring the SSR cyberattacks. When no one else spoke, she cleared her throat. “Well, it seems to be working.” The Erkennen Faction’s expert had transferred her admiration from the enemy to Rahim for his stalwart cyberdefense.

Bekah’s face flattened and she rubbed her eyes. “You guys got this? I’m tired. I need some sleep.”

“Sure,” Maya Breides said. “You and Daniel were here all night. Carrin and I have this.”

Carrin offered a thumbs-up of confirmation, then turned back to her screen.

Daniel got to his feet. “I think I’ll hit the gym.”

Fischer stood when Bekah stood. “I’ll escort you to your quarters,” he said. “I’m due a little shut-eye myself.”

“That isn’t necessary.”

“Sure, except that it is,” Fischer said. “I’m your shadow. Regent’s orders.”

Bekah’s face flashed an expression that was too tired to argue. “Sure. Okay.” She led the way from the War Room.

“I’ll send Richter to stand watch with you guys,” Fischer said over his shoulder.

Carrin gave another distracted thumbs up. Had Maya winced at the sound of Richter’s name? Bekah couldn’t blame her. Even more than Fischer, Richter tickled her creepy bone.

How perceptive , Bekah thought. What she said was: “Whatever gave you that idea?”

Their footsteps bounced off the walls of the empty corridor. The lights were set to fifty percent brilliance. Anyone looking in from the outside would think the station empty, part of a narrative Gregor Erkennen had leaked through semi-secure channels he knew were being tapped. The Erkennen Faction and all its secrets were turtled up in Prometheus Colony, the story went. Not easily defended, to all appearances, Masada Station had been abandoned. Move along, Cassandra. Nothing to see here.

“I study people for a living,” Fischer answered. “Especially people I’m contracted to protect.”

Bekah nodded. He’d reminded her of something it was easy to forget under the abrasion of Fischer’s personality. He was here at her regent’s request. She didn’t have to like him. She just had to tolerate him.

“Coffee?” she said. The cafeteria was just ahead. She could use the diversion. A twelve-hour shift in the War Room made you long for walls that looked like anywhere else.

Fischer cocked an eyebrow. “I thought you were looking for shut-eye.”

“I was looking to get out of there. Watching the attacks on the Labyrinth, even knowing that’s exactly what we want to be happening … every time I see code turn red, my anxiety spikes. I need to rest. My brain more than my body.”

Fischer nodded. “Coffee’s good.”

The cafeteria was dark. All lights defaulted to off except in occupied areas, and those were set to the fifty percent luminescent threshold. Windows facing outward to space were set to maximum opacity, effectively blacking them out. All external comms traffic was forbidden, including calls to Titan—to prevent accidentally opening a back door to the station for Cassandra, Bekah told Fischer when he asked for an explanation. Internal comms were allowed only on a local network with a range that stopped at the station’s walls.

Bekah stepped the cafeteria. The motion sensors switched on the lights to half brightness. Vacant but for the two of them, the hall designed to accommodate fifty or more personnel felt cavernous and cold. Its white walls and chrome fixtures and tables and chairs shone with their own emptiness.

After programming the coffeemaker, Bekah joined Fischer at his table. The sound of heating water shushed behind her.

“It’s not that I don’t like you.” Bekah felt inexplicably guilty that Fischer had pegged her feelings so accurately. It made her feel like an open book exposed to his flat, probing eyes. “You seem like a dark man to me,” she said with a sudden need to be authentic. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

“Never heard it put quite that way before, but that’s pretty spot-on.” Fischer took off his hat and set it on the table. “I’m in a dark business. It’s not for sunny people.”

That truth was so on-the-nose, it made her smile. Like everything else, Bekah had heard stories of SynCorp’s seedier side. Seen the vids on The Real Story , had wondered about them. She’d known the factions employed fixers, enforcers, assassins—whatever you wanted to call them—to see that the business necessary for making the Company was done. Meeting Bruno Richter upon her arrival at Prometheus Colony had been a singular moment of revelation for her. It wasn’t pretty, but it was necessary—that’s what her Opa Simon had once explained. A strange rationalization coming from such a deep-thinking man, she now thought.

“It’s just that…” Bekah began, not quite sure how to put it. “I lost my grandfather recently.”

Fischer cleared his throat. “I heard. My condolences.”

“Thanks,” she said, meaning it. There was something about this man, an odor of personality. It came on strong at first, smelled offensive because it was refreshingly honest, if dark—not hidden by social niceties or a cordial veneer cloaking some personal political agenda. Fischer seemed a simple man of obvious intent. Sarcastic and bold and enviable in his transparency. But, Bekah was coming to realize, Fischer was really a multilayered, complex man wearing a mask that hid the hard heart of a brutal killer. Yet, even that seemed too simple an answer for the Fischer equation. In a way, he reminded her of her opa, and that thought almost made Bekah laugh.

The coffeemaker beeped once.

“Hypnos’s bane,” Fischer said.

“What?” Bekah asked, rising. She grabbed two insulated cups and drew the coffee.

“The Greek god of sleep, Hypnos. I’m guessing he hated coffee.”

Bekah handed him a cup and sat. With Fischer’s explanation, the reference came back to her. Part of her classical training, Opa Simon’s influence. An assassin familiar with obscure Greek deities? Like her grandfather, indeed. Simon Franklin, master of philosophy and archaic trivia. Apologist for the Syndicate Corporation.

“I think you and my grandfather would’ve gotten along,” she said. “You’re both fans of long and winding conversations.”

“Those can be the best kind.”

“That’s what he’d say!” Bekah allowed with light laughter. “He’d say we don’t learn if we don’t explore.”

Fischer offered a supportive nod. “True enough, I guess. Sometimes you find the good by exploring.” He took a swig of coffee and grimaced. “Sometimes you don’t.” The way he said it got her attention.

“Why did you go into … the line of work you do?” she asked. Voicing the question embarrassed her. She hardly knew Fischer. She couldn’t even tell him to take his feet off a computer console. She wasn’t sure how much better she wanted to know him.

He took another sip of coffee, then appeared to make a decision.

“The Weather War was tough on everyone,” Fischer said. “And before that, when whole populations were migrating inward from the coasts, away from submerging cities… I’m talking about Earth now—long time before you were born, kid. People wanted to live where the food was and the floods weren’t. Insurance companies went under because claims outdistanced premiums. Governments tried to take up the slack, but their coffers ran dry too. When the world’s power grid and transportation system started to fail, the global economy went to shit. Tens of thousands moved to government poorhouses.”

Fischer looked at Bekah, and there was a weariness behind his eyes. “We’d lived in luxury for so long, we forgot what it was built on. But we found out, boy-o. Mother Universe reminded us.” He took a long swig from his cup.

Bekah listened, drinking her coffee while Fischer spoke. She knew the history, and what Opa Simon had told her fit what Fischer said. No wonder mankind had stepped into space. Desperate people take desperate chances. Sometimes, you decided to hell with the devil you knew.

“You didn’t answer my question,” she said. “About why you got into the … business you’re in.”

“Yeah,” Fischer said. “I didn’t.” He brushed a finger toward her cup. “Take that to go? I’ll see you safely to your quarters. And I need to roust Richter out for his shift guarding the geek squad.”

Bekah knew the end of a conversation when she heard one. She refreshed her coffee, and they left the cafeteria. The motion sensors cut the lights behind them as they stepped into the corridor. The lift took them up to the vacant eeriness of the habitat level. The dim half-light snapped on as they stepped onto Level Three of the station. Unlike earlier, Bekah found herself glad to have Fischer walking beside her. She keyed in the lock code to her quarters while he waited like an awkward date.