I apologise in advance for this terrible excuse for a chapter. I thought I needed to update soon and I haven't really been writing because of a death in the family and needed to help sort out arrangements. Hopefully it will inspire me some more to write about the death of Trinity's 'mother figure', but at the moment I have writers... not 'block' but more 'misdirection'. At the moment I can't really write, but the second I get my right hand back, I'll re-write these chapters.
Please don't kill me if you work for the IRS and know exactly what it is, because, quite frankly, I don't have a clue. I tried to a little research by going on the official website, but to be honest it went in one eye and out the other. I managed to get something about taxes, but apart from that I got totally confused. Flame if you think is necessary, but bare in mind that I will be changing these ASAP. I'm also going to post a chapter of a fic that I started writing a few weeks ago pretty randomly, so please read. It's called 'Bleh' at the moment; because I cant think of a title for it.
Anyway, read and (hopefully) enjoy.
Nova x
~
Chapter 4
2 months later.
She had nearly run out of money. That weird...'thing' that happened a few months back had now completely enveloped and absorbed her mind. She was now a complete and total addict.
It was the information that she was after. She needed answers to her questions. There was no FAQ web site holding the answers that she had to have. How did he do it? Did she imagine it? Who was he? What did he want? What did she want?
She was hardly sleeping. Sometimes she would wake to find her computer still running searches in front of her. She could never tell how long she slept for - 20 minutes or 2 hours, it never made a difference. And she needed more money to fund her obsession.
Which is when it hit her. She had all of this talent, all of this power at her fingertips. Here, she could make anything happen. Well, almost anything. She didn't need to be sitting there, worrying about her financial situation. Getting a job was out of the question. So she realised what she was going to do.
She knew about Internet fraud. Of course she did. Everyone did. She knew the risks. But she also knew that she could beat the odds. She was quick and untraceable. And this is what led her to her decision.
~
It had been three weeks. It had been three weeks and she was only beginning to relax. It had been three weeks, and she was famous.
She still hadn't heard from Cooper. She wasn't worried. Perhaps he had taken the same risks and had been caught.
And then it hit her. She could find out what had happened to him. She had lists of social security numbers. She had lists of who the FBI and CIA had their eye on. She had lists of real names and alternative identities. She knew the true identities of some of the most legendary hackers. And her name was the only one on the list with no real name, address or SSN.
She had contemplated changing her name to something else. Now she was so popularly known, it was dangerous for people to know when she was online. People would say to her, 'Wow, Trinity. It was only three weeks ago when you hacked into the IRS CPU!' and she would be proud for a millisecond and then get sick of it. She only did it to get money, to erase her finances, and to try and find ...him. It had been almost three months, and she wished she had turned the ring on her phone back on when he asked her.
That's when it hit her. Did she turn it back on after that day? She didn't think so. If he just rang one more time then she wouldn't need to keep looking. She got up, stretching her legs, and then walked over to the shelf with the telephone on it.
She was right. She hadn't turned it back on. Almost three whole months, and she didn't even think to check. He might have tried to call her again. She would have missed it. If only she hadn't been so harsh and cold and untrusting. All she knew about him was that he was so high up; even the IRS didn't have him listed.
She thought about what this meant. She had had this one chance, of finding that escape from her limited reality. And what did she do with it? She blew it. Her one chance. And what if there wasn't going to be another one? Would she spend the rest of her life here, in this bare apartment, stealing money from the government to buy her weekly shopping on the Internet? Could she go on like this forever? Or would she give up and ring one of her old ex-friends. Apologise for kicking up a scene at the funeral and invite them out for lunch. The funeral... she had hardly thought about it for months and months on end. The most major loss in her life and she still hadn't mourned it.
But however unsure of her future she was, she knew that she would never return to those traitors.
She flicked the ring back on the telephone. Any second now, she knew it. It would ring.
She thought she would have been more anxious. But she just stood, waiting for his call. She was so sure of herself there was no need for nerves. Her eyes flicked gently back to her computer screen, where her list of identities waited. Any second now, she knew it.
She didn't even bat an eyelid when the phone began to ring.
~
