The Offer
By Shaine and Shatterclaw. Individual rating of PG for
language and violence.
It was a job offer. From Starbright Industries in Chicago. Shaine thought for a moment...no. She couldn't remember any tech stock symbols for Starbright Industries. Had to be a startup. Or a front. FBI, Genom, anyone she'd pissed off in the past eight or so years.
She memorized the phone number, then packed up a few essentials - change of clothes, toothbrush, laptop - and took them out to the car. She sure as hell wasn't going to lead Starbright Industries back to her home. She drove to Birmingham, then parked not too far from a pay phone.
Crowd looked normal. Right. Midmorning, no school-age children, a few business suits...mostly looked like affluent housewives shopping for baubles and trinkets. She picked up the phone.
The weight of an unregistered Miyako in her left pocket reassured her as she used a fake phone card number and connected to the mystery number.
"United Airlines, how may I help you?" The voice was female, young...a bit too sweet. Shaine immediately decided not to trust her.
"Yeah, I got a reservation for a flight..." She rustled some papers to mask the sound of a passerby with a cell phone. "Number 327 to Chicago."
"Name, please?"
"Lore Mueller." It was the alias she'd used on that particular e-mail account, as well as all the records that could possibly lead back to her from the Genom/ADP hack.
She turned her back to the phone and started scanning the crowd for misfits as the airline operator stalled. It was taking too long.
"I'm sorry, but we have no reservations under that name."
"Try Kohl. The reservation was booked by some startup computer company in Indiana; they must have gotten hold of a resume with my maiden name on it."
"Ah, yes, we do have one for a Miss Kohl." Damn! Whoever it was, they had some real talent working for them... "Would you like to pick up your ticket or should I have it delivered to you?"
"Bring it here." She rattled off an address in Eastpointe, just outside Detroit. Scummy neighborhood...but that was why she had her second apartment there.
"They'll be there by 1pm today."
"Thanks." She hung up quickly. One...that leaves me just enough time to clean out the apartment, pack it all in the trunk, and ride. She thought about leaving a note for her boyfriend...but...no. It was all but over anyway.
She left a time-delayed e-mail from several of her accounts - including a new one - to Erik, saying that if he got the message something had happened to her. She could delete it once she found out what was going on. It was tough going trying to lift her monitor...ahhhhh...screw it. She could get a new one; all she really needed was the CPU and her disks. Besides, she had the laptop.
She arrived early. No one there. She headed back up to Gratiot and 8 Mile, made a few cue balls dizzy at her old pool hall, then returned. It was almost one.
She saw a young man in his twenties...physique that said I love chocolate. Shaine let her left hand drift toward her pocket. Uh, you know where I can find... The address was that of her apartment.
"Yeah. It's right over there." He walked up and rang the bell. Damn. She was going to have to sign for it, wasn't she? "I live there. You coulda asked."
He went on ringing the bell.
"Want me to open the door and prove it?" She brandished her keyring as if it were a magical talisman.
"You Miss Kohl?"
"Um....yeah." She still didn't feel comfortable letting the opposition - enemy? - know so much about her. "My maiden name, actually."
"Whatever. Sign here."
She took the clipboard, bracing it with her left arm so that she could let it drop at a moment's notice, and signed choppily with her right hand. With any luck the signature would be inadmissable, as she didn't normally write with her right hand and it looked nothing at all like the way she normally signed things. Her left hand twitched...but Chocolate Boy was just swaying gently on his feet, not preparing to rush her. She shoved the clipboard back at him, then retreated a step and slid her hand into her pocket.
"Thanks," he said disinterestedly, and gave her the ticket. Then he held out his hand.
Tip. Right. She pulled a wadded-up five out of her right pocket.
After watching the pudgy courier leave on his motorcycle, she headed for a nicer neighborhood and spent the rest of the day window shopping. Her flight wasn't until ten the next morning. She then got a fitful night's rest at a nearby motel, unpacking only the computer equipment so that it would not get cold in the trunk, and arrived at the airport an hour early.
The Boomer at the United desk cheerily informed her that the flight was leaving out of terminal three, and gave her an envelope.
A cautious distance away from the desk, Shaine opened it. A cash card...presumably for her expenses. She checked the amount at a nearby ATM and was suitably impressed.
///
Several delays later, Shaine arrived in Chicago at 1:30. She checked into the hotel that Starlight had chosen, considering it a necessary risk, then plugged in. What better way to start off a visit to a new city than with a visit to the local Genom subsidiary? Genom Chicago proved considerably tougher than Genom Rochester or Genom Windsor...Shaine stopped without breaking their firewall; she was hungry.
She saw the note with Starbright's phone number on the desk just before she dialed room service. Better call while she was thinking about it. Too lazy to bother anything more, she pulled out her own cell phone and used a fake caller ID. After several minutes of being on hold, during which her stomach joyfully rediscovered its musical talents, she was transferred to an office number.
"Veldez speaking. How may I help you?"
"I'm calling about the job offer. Name's Kohl."
"Ah, yes. Miss Kohl. I'm glad you called. You come highly recommended." By whom? But she kept her mouth shut. "Could you perhaps make it to our offices tomorrow...mmm, around 11am?"
"Sure. Just give me the address."
It was downtown, in the underground shopping plaza. Veldez thanked her and hung up, polite but very much to the point. Shaine grabbed the room service menu and ordered. Four hours later, the entire floor was covered by plates, papers, disks, clothing, and crumbs. Shaine lay on the floor by her laptop, figuring out routes to and from the Starbright Building.
Oh, damn - she forgot about the message. She deleted every copy of the time-delayed come help me e-mail and decided to send Erik something more sociable. Minutes later, she had a reply. He wanted to meet her for lunch the next day, after her interview.
She chuckled at the last line:
I sincerely hope that you will not consider it necessary to do to Genom Chicago what you did to Genom Windsor. Love, Erik.
Just then the phone rang. It was Erik. "Thought I couldn't track you down? HAH! I got you!"
"Eriiiiik!" She sounded genuinely delighted.
"So, where you going tomorrow?"
"Some company called Starbright Industries."
"Those tree huggers?" He sighed. "If you insist. You can take the B EL down there; it's probably the easiest way."
"The Bel? You mean like Captain Thorne from the Vorkosigan saga?"
Erik laughed out loud at that one. "The Bullet El. It's kind of like the DPM."
"Oh, okay. I'm jiggy with Da People Mover."
"Only takes ten minutes or so. You get off at State Street." She knew that much from her planning, but she just thanked him and promised not to get lost on the way to lunch. After several minutes worth of closing remarks and endearments, she hung up. Good thing she'd left that until after she finished eating.
On the way to the meeting, Shaine was impressed by the apparent change in the downtown area. She'd never been to Chicago, but of course she had seen images of the destruction caused when satellite weapons accidentally opened fire on the city. Genom's intervention had transformed the area from a hollowed-out shell into a thriving center of business.
It was a bit like the Eaton's Center in Toronto...one giant underground mall filled with stores and offices that couldn't afford to open their doors aboveground. Shaine passed stores selling clothing, jewelry, several sorts of domestic Boomers... She promised herself to come back to some of them later.
Inside the lower level of the Starbright Foundation Building was a simple desk and what appeared to be five or six elevator tubes. The doors opened by themselves. The guard smiled and asked if he could help her.
"I'm here to see Ms. Veldez."
"Third tube. Take it to the top floor."
It took about five minutes. When the doors opened, Shaine was blinded by the bright light inside the office. The walls were made of large glass panes and most of the rest of the room was glass, at least as much of it as she could see.
When her eyes adjusted, she saw a large circular desk, behind which sat a green-haired woman. She repeated her request to see Veldez.
"Please have a seat. She'll be with you in a moment."
Fifteen minutes later, a woman in a tan Euro business suit stepped into the room. Shaine rose as the woman walked toward her. "Miss Kohl?"
"Yes?"
"I'm Saki Veldez." She appeared to perhaps have some Japanese blood as well as Hispanic. Her hair was red with a white streak near the front. "Would you like something to drink before we get started?"
"No, thank you."
She got straight to business. "I received your resume from a colleague at Genom."
"Oh?"
"Yes...he said that you were very skilled."
"Ahhh...I think I know who that may be."
"Your network administration skills are most impressive. We are opening a new system research wing, and thought that you would be perfectly suited for it. Also, we are looking for a consultant for our web design group."
"To be honest, I had no intention of leaving Michigan at this time. I'm not sure if I'm interested." Shaine could tell that Veldez was holding something back.
"Well...yes, this is a bit abrupt. However, we believe we can offer sufficient compensation. To be specific, full medical and dental plans including coverage of alternative medicine, a wonderful 401k plan, corner offices, and a starting pay of $35,000 a year."
Shaine had followed the woman's speech appreciatively until that last figure. "Thirty-five? That's standard industry starting pay! I may not have a college degree, but I suggest you take a second look at my resume."
"Good to see that you have some fire...what would you consider more acceptable? Perhaps $75,000?" Either she's very stupid, or she's baiting me. What the hell is she playing at?
"Ahhhh...I think that would be more acceptable."
"And how about this?" She scribbled a figure on a piece of paper: $80,500.
"Very acceptable indeed..."
"Well, then! What can I tell you about our modest little corporation?"
"I'm not familiar with the name. A local company?"
"Not as local as we may seem. We have branches in every major city in the world, and as of this week we own over 55% of the natural-growing farms in the world and are in the forefront of bioengineered foods...as well as heading up a large investment firm."
"Not in the computer industry, then... I see."
She was turning frosty...but still interested by the money. "Not per se," Saki answered quickly. "While our main output is food, there is a growing need to stay ahead of our competition...making it necessary for us to keep up to date with technology. That's where you come in."
"How large of a group would I be working with? How much training have they had?"
"What we currently have in place is an up-to-date system...and the desire to keep that edge. What we do not have is a team to maintain it. That team would be hand-picked by you. We would be prepared to pull them from any department or subsidiary, or to hire new employees."
"And this system...are we talking about production? Inventory?"
"Both, there. The system covers all of our endeavors from start to finish and is fully integrated."
"I must admit...it's been awhile since I've worked with the hardware interfacing angle. MetaPara would not, of course, let me have the source code for its proprietary Boomer algorithms."
"I think you'll find us to be a bit more open. And more than able to bring you up to speed. One of our subsidiaries repairs Boomers..." Her voice turned dark. "Which seems more and more demand as increasing numbers of Boomers go rogue..." Then, suddenly, she was back to her normal tone of voice. "In fact, if that's where you wish to begin, I can arrange to put you on the team that is heading up that new project."
"Not...not quite." she said quickly. "I'm in the business more for the pure software. Networking and such."
"Ah, well. Maybe later."
"Of course," but her face gave a far different answer.
"How well do you work with custom software?"
"That's no issue. I consulted with some others on Novell's latest release, and most of them seemed to have an aversion to proper documentation." She sounded wryly amused.
"And how well do you deal with custom-built systems and their unit hardware?"
"Depends on the hardware. Like I said, MetaPara kept me in the dark. Also, I think I should mention that I'm not going to be writing on the Opcode level. You want that kind of code wizard, you look elsewhere."
"Then let me come show you what we have in store..." She stood, holding out her arm. Shaine followed, watching Veldez use some sort of ID card to open the doors of another elevator. A few minutes later, the doors opened again onto a hall which ended in a pair of glass doors. Veldez opened one with a swipe of the card, and lead Shaine down another hallway to a large bay window. "This window overlooks our mainframe. We don't use any standard system, so it is larger than most. At the current time, we are using a bilingual OS."
It didn't look like anything Shaine had ever seen, save the one time she passed by the ENIAC, encased in glass at the University of Michigan and guarded like it was made of diamond... "That will make things interesting. Is the OS based on another system?"
"Ah, yes. It's similar to the one used by SiliconGraphics, or so I'm told. Would you like to look it over?"
"Sure." Irix, how I have loved you...so did they kluge and hack the OS together or is she just talking out of her ass?
Another hall, another glass door...another swipe of the card. This time there was an retinal scan as well, and a code to be punched in. A staircase lay on the other side.
Saki logged Shaine in, and the operating system came up. Shaine pulled up a dialog window and began typing quickly. She brought up several control panels, looked them over...resisted the urge to curse. They were larger than expected - larger, in fact, than the company would need for years. It was the most powerful system Shaine had ever seen.
"Well, I can't tell too much just by looking at this...but whoever ha- aaah, modified the OS for you seems to have known what they were doing."
"Well, we have some very talented people working for us!" Saki smiled.
"I see. Quite impressive." Shaine easily managed to slip in a few back door mechanisms which would allow her to study it later...on her own terms.
A smaller dialog popped up. Do you want to play a game?
"Hm? What's this?" Shaine tried to look puzzled, when actually it was the first thing she'd expect. Bigger computer, better gaming. No surprise. "I think your last programmers had a little too much fun on the job... Well. Might as well look it over." She started the game.
It was a first-person shooter, not too unlike Quake. A cartoon-like Boomer ran toward the screen and Shaine easily shot it down. More came at her, their speed increasing. She smiled. Software engineers...they're all alike. Well, the men are anyway. She kept pace with the program as it sped up more, the Boomers getting larger...
Shaine frowned. They were getting damned big. The screen suddenly acquired a reddish tint.
One down, two to go... Saki, standing behind her, was absolutely rapt.
"You really need a joystick for these games...but then it's not like anyone is supposed to b--" She jumped and swore under her breath in German. "What was that?"
"I think that one shot at you," Saki replied, quite amused.
"Yeah..."
"There, you got it back!" But she lost her last life on a three-headed Boomer. By that point she had forgotten where she was.
"Aw, shit! That was great! It's been too long..." She chuckled and put her feet up. "I remember back in college...I used to be able to whip all the sorry little engineering frat boys..."
"Well, if you like, perhaps we could transfer it to your workstations."
"Oh! Ahhhhh...well, you know, it's never quite the same once it ends..." She wilted.
"To be honest, I'd like to know who put it there."
"I think I may be able to do that for you..."
"Yes, please."
"I can at least nail it down to a specific terminal...then we see who was logged in." She frowned. "That's odd..."
"What is it?"
"I think you may want to have a little talk with your previous employees. The logs have been erased."
"I see." Saki narrowed her eyes. "Is there any way you could backtrack it?"
"Depends. If they were erased, I can probably dig them out. If it's been security wiped..."
"Please try," Saki said, apparently unaware that Shaine had already started. Moments later, Shaine clapped her hands and did a sort of waist-up touchdown dance as a list of files appeared on the screen.
"There! It should still be in this mess..."
"...Have you found it...?"
"Here. I've got an IP address... You use static IPs here, so it should be no problem to track that back to a terminal...aha! Terminal 2300."
"Hm...that should be on floor 1002."
"I'm getting a long list. With the information I recovered, you should be able to match the date and time on the execution file to a time when one of these people was at the terminal."
"Thank you."
Shaine leaned back and put her feet up again.
"Now, regarding your employment here...are you interested?"
"I'll...have to think about it."
"Please, take your time!"
"I expect to be in Chicago for another day or two...certainly that will be long enough."
"That will be fine." She handed Shaine a business card. "If you have any questions, please feel free to call."
"Of course."
///
Shaine stepped off of the B EL and into a district with...well...intimidating looks. The restaurant was just ahead, and the tall figure in front of it...
"Erik! Over here!" She waved, then watched his eyes play over her. She was wearing one of his outfits...he smiled.
Once she was close enough, he swept one arm around her and escorted her in. She leaned against him a little, enjoying it even if it was flattery. He felt a twinge in the arm but covered it up with another indulgent grin, squeezing her shoulder gently. "Guten Tag, Prinzessin," he whispered. The same expensive suits, the same hollow worship...yes, it was Erik all right, and it felt like being home again.
The menu shook her out of that feeling: an appetizer alone cost as much as a full slab of ribs back at her favorite place in Mt. Clemens. She immediately decided to skip straight to dessert and told Erik as much.
"I'm afraid I can't do that anymore..." He patted his slightly rounded stomach, which was probably all muscle beneath the finery. "Someday, my child, this beer belly will be yours.."
They ordered, and Shaine asked for a Coke with her death wish in chocolate. Erik gave her a funny look, but she held her ground. He got the usual and asked the waitress Boomer if they had any Warsteiner.
"I don't know, sir."
"Will you check for me?"
"Yes, sir."
The beer arrived as requested with the rest of the meal. "So, darling...why exactly are you here? Not just to talk to those liberal wussies, are you?"
"Of course not. I just simply couldn't keep away from you for so long..." She was pouring it on thick, but he pretended to be pleased with the answer. "I know you gave them my name just to get me to come."
"I didn't give them your name."
"Hm. That's odd."
"I'd like to know who did, then! They mentioned Genom?"
"Yeah."
Erik's questions became more pointed, then. He covered it up with more flattery and compliments on her work on the Genom Tokyo and ADP hacks.
She took a large sip of her drink, then set it down again. It was less than half full by now. Erik began to tip his beer bottle toward it, giving her little time to react.
"Don't."
He did anyway. She frowned and resolved not to touch it...until she began to get thirsty again. She could feel every ridge on her chapped lips...well, maybe one sip.
Soon it was nearly empty and she considered calling the waitress back. But the next time she looked at the glass it was nearly half full again.
"You know...Genom made a huge mistake when you were fired."
"I wasn't actually fired. I agreed to leave after they found out about-- She glanced around the room. You know."
"They ought to know by now that the rules don't apply where success is concerned."
Shaine suddenly began to feel dizzy.
"Are you all right?"
"I'm not sure..."
"Let me take you back to the hotel. You can get some rest. The past few days must have been tiring."
///
As Shaine clumsily grabbed the back door of the car, she noticed someone already inside it. The secretarial Boomer smiled and gathered up a scattering of papers to make room for her.
"Ah - Susan, why don't you drive."
The Boomer placed the papers on the front passenger seat and got out of the car as Shaine reached for the seat belt. Erik caught her hand and slid in next to her. He placed her arm around him, making it nearly impossible to be comfortable without lying her head on his chest. Too dazed to resist, she did so.
Erik mentally cursed Carter for giving him a chaperone at a time like this. It was a delicate situation already, with that damned Birdman, and he didn't want to take any chances that he didn't have to.
///
"Are you sure you don't want me to walk you to your room?" He was so close that Shaine could feel his breath on her cheek.
"I'm sure. She didn't need him to babysit her...even if she was getting ready to pass out..."
"Maybe I was wrong," Erik murmured. "You are like Evon."
It rattled her, but she didn't respond. Shaine opened the door. "Goodbye."
As she walked up to the hotel, two young men stepped in front of her. "Hey, lady...you got a few creds to spare?"
Shaine started to walk around them. One grabbed her and she mumbled something incoherent...it sounded like German.
"Didn't you hear my friend here?" It was the bigger one. He had a tube running from one temple to his back, some sort of implant...
"Give us the creds!" The short one yelled. Several block-like things protruded from his head.
"Huuuh?" Shaine was beginning to come back to herself, and she didn't like what she saw.
"I said give us your money...what the frag, can't you speak the lingo?" The tall one pulled out a knife.
Shaine threw her purse off at an angle, closer to him, then wriggled out of the short one's grasp. One of her rings fell to the pavement with a soft chime. The short one tried to grab her again, but she easily slid away. Some people would be surprised at how agile a small woman becomes when she has practice in sneaking behind and under desks to check network connections.
Once inside the hotel, Shaine had time enough to wish that she had paid more attention in the self-defense lessons Erik made her take. She went straight to her room and collapsed on the bed, shaking.
Damn him. Damn him for doing this to me...
But he wanted to help. And he made me take those lessons in the first place...really, it was my fault for refusing him.
Wasn't it.
///
Shaine's head hurt like hell. She heard a knock at the door...
Still a bit off-balance, she wandered over to look through the peephole. A Boomer. Scheizen. Who is it?
"Housekeeping, ma'am!"
Shaine opened the door a crack. "Do you want your room cleaned?" She let the Boomer in. Then she got dressed and took something for her raging headache. Once the Boomer was finished, it told her that she had a message at the desk.
"All right. I'll get it later." The door closed behind the Boomer.
///
"I heard I have a message. Room 644."
The man behind the desk tried to hide his newspaper. "Yes...someone said you dropped this last night."
It was her purse.
///
Back in her room, Shaine found that everything in her purse was just as she'd left it. ID, disks...
In fact, a bit more than she'd left. Thirty dollars more in her wallet, and a note saying...
We're sorry. We won't bother you again.
Beneath that, it gave the names and addresses of her attackers...as well as the cell blocks to which they had been assigned.
"Okaaay, I'm alone in a strange city, I just got mugged and earned money, Genom wants me back...
"How the fuck do I get back out of the looking glass?"