Freedom Incorporated by Peter Tylee (the best ebook reader for android .TXT) 📕

directly into the New South Wales Police Department’s network. Well that’s stupid of them. Cookie couldn’t understand why a network administrator would authorise something like that. No protection at all… He wasted no time burrowing from the Department’s uninteresting network and gaining access to the mainstream nano-net. From there he linked up with his pipeline and entered the heart of UniForce’s network, feeling torn between his hammer-type attack on Echelon and digging for information that might help Dan recover Jen. In the end, he settled for both.

He had to be careful not to trigger electronic traps. Now they were everywhere, not just near Echelon, and they slowed his progress. His adversaries had planted them like mines around every major system. Like bear-traps, they would clamp around his paws the instant he came within range and alert UniForce personnel of his whereabouts. It understandably made Cookie nervous.

Echelon, he determined, was impenetrable. Somebody had run an impassable ring around it during the interlude. Damn. Cookie swore luridly in his mind. Still, he had to admire the beautiful simplicity of the solution. They knew he was on their network and that repairing the UG7 barriers would take time, so they’d erected a rigid blockade around Echelon, their most prized possession. He couldn’t reach it, not anymore. A heavy feeling settled in his chest. All that work for nothing.

Samantha felt his sorrowful vibrations from the kitchen and took a break from her frustrating culinary exercise to see what was wrong. “What is it?”

“We were away too long,” Cookie explained. “They’ve tucked Echelon into a steel box and buried it in their backyard.”

“So? You can cut through steel, can’t you?”

He slowly shook his head, feeling defeated. “Not this time. Whoever did this is good enough to know what he’s doing.” He grudgingly admired it. Cookie would complement even a hated enemy if he or she did something particularly clever. “There’s no way through this. They’ve restricted network traffic to the bare minimum Echelon needs to do its job. And I can’t slip in pretending to be genuine data because it scans those streams for executables. Fuck me, but they’ve even locked themselves out, so I don’t know how they intend to do maintenance.” He mused over that for a moment. “They must have a key, but they’ve buried the lock. So only they know where to find the door.”

“Oh,” Samantha said, mirroring his sorrow for deeper reasons than mourning over Echelon. “Well don’t worry about it. What’s the point now Jen’s gone anyway?”

Cookie pulled her to sit on his lap, wrapped his arms around her, and drew her close for the hug he knew she needed. “Hey, it’s going to be okay.”

“Oh yeah?” She snorted indelicately. “How’s that? Jen’s probably dead already.”

“Don’t say that.” Cookie was desperately clutching to hope and was finding the straws harder to hold onto than he’d imagined. “There’s a chance she’s still alive and I’m sure she wouldn’t want you talking about her like she’s already dead. She’d want you to keep hoping for her, wouldn’t she?”

Samantha smeared silent tears across her cheeks. “I guess.”

“What do you think of Dan?”

She shrugged. “He’s already saved Jen once, so I guess he’s all right.”

“‘All right’ enough to save her again?” Cookie asked, wondering whether it was smart to pin all their hopes on one man. And a bounty hunter at that… not the most dependable profession.

“I hope so.” The fragile quiver in Samantha’s voice spoke volumes about how little hope she actually had, she was just trying to project the appearance of hope for Cookie’s sake. Bubbly and cheerful much of the time, she was also a realist. She knew Jen’s chances were slim.

“Well, Echelon’s out of the question, so I can dedicate my time to digging up helpful information.” Cookie squeezed Samantha tight, trying to impart some of his feigned strength.

“And I have some more sacrificing to do in the kitchen.” Samantha kissed him on the forehead before scooting away and Cookie felt her lips on his skin long after she’d removed them, leaving him warm and fuzzy to offset the desolation within.

A datamining program returned some interesting results and enveloped his train of thought. He’d set the application to work mining for information about Esteban’s history, cross-referenced with Dan. There were five records and he examined each in chronological order.

The first was a memorandum from the previous assassination co-ordinator. Interesting… Cookie wondered how damaging that single record could be; UniForce spent much time and advertising money denying the existence of their assassination branch while simultaneously promoting it in the corporate underworld. He suspected he had access to enough information to indict the entire management team and sink the company for good, so he began caching all the records he inspected, just in case. It was tempting to replicate the whole database but he knew that would create enough network traffic to alert even the sleepiest system administrator. He or she would simply have to follow the torrent of data back to the Department’s network and from there it would only take minutes to pinpoint his location. Tempting, but too dangerous.

Irritation oozed through the memorandum in which the co-ordinator outlined the problem: a lowly Australian detective based in Parramatta wasn’t dropping the UniForce-tagged case. It finished by recommending UniForce apply pressure on the Australian Government to control the rogue officer.

The second record detailed how political pressure had been unsuccessful in dissuading the determined detective, Dan Sutherland. Furthermore, the situation was becoming dire: Sutherland was sniffing at the assassin’s heels. The co-ordinator said he had reprimanded the operative, Esteban Garcia Valdez, for his slovenly procedures, which had enabled Sutherland to track him. He’d used the record to reinforce UniForce’s work ethos and warn active assassins to act professionally at all times - UniForce would not tolerate sloppy killings.

Cookie, totally hooked, devoured the third record. It depicted the horrors UniForce had inflicted upon Dan to persuade him to drop the case. They’d slaughtered his cat and scattered its entrails across his property, phoned him every night to deliver death threats, and offered staggering sums of money as a bribe. Jesus H Christ, Cookie thought. Who the hell is this guy? He couldn’t think of anyone stubborn enough to withstand the brunt of UniForce’s shit. The list of atrocities scrolled for three pages, a catalogue of horror that chilled Cookie’s blood. But the record made it clear that UniForce had been meticulously careful to veil their hand in the matter. As far as Dan was concerned, Esteban had orchestrated everything alone.

He was almost afraid to open the fourth record. When he did, the words assaulted him with a dark portrayal of Esteban’s arrest. Whoever had updated the database had been furious that someone had poached one of UniForce’s top assassins. It listed serious justifications for declaring company emergency. Esteban had been one of the few assassins with detailed knowledge about UniForce’s assassination branch. The co-ordinator was worried he might use the information as currency to buy himself a lenient sentence. UniForce therefore applied the full weight of their political muscle and the fifth record was a glowing report of their success; Esteban was off the hook. Yeah, but only thanks to a dubious judicial decision. Cookie wasn’t impressed. So much for judges being impervious to bribes. But UniForce had stripped Esteban of his field status, planting him in management instead.

How could he start working for such an evil company? It didn’t make sense. Even if he didn’t know they were the ones who killed his cat, he knew they were behind the assassination. Didn’t he put two and two together? Cookie was puzzling over it when the datamining application dredged up two more records.

He read them hungrily, his appetite whetted by the developing mystery. “Oh my God.”

Samantha had just walked in, balancing two plates of slop and two sets of cutlery. She put one on the bench Cookie was using as a desk. “Here’s your soup.”

“Ta,” he replied absently, reading the final records a second and third time.

“What’s ‘oh my god’?” Samantha asked, tasting her concoction and wishing she’d found some salt in the cupboard.

“I know why Dan’s wife was murdered… and I know why Esteban was the one who did it.”

“What?” She abandoned the soup and leant over his shoulder to read the words herself.

“We’ve gotta buzz Simon.” Cookie was trying hard to regulate his breathing. “Dan would wanna know about this.”

“Already? The poor guy probably just got home.”

“He said to call him if we needed anything, and this is important,” Cookie rationalised.

A few seconds more and she capitulated. “Okay, what’s the number?”

He gave her Simon’s card. “Just one ring.”

“I remember.” She dialled his number, let it ring once, then terminated the call and replaced the receiver. “Okay, now what?”

Cookie resumed datamining. “Now we wait.”