Part 3 (1/2)

PLEASE PROTECT YOUR HOLDINGS.

The Vault has detected a DNA-a.s.sisted decryption attack directed at your account. Your holdings have not been compromised ...

The fiefcorp apprentice smacked her hand loudly against the wall and stomped off to the living room. Jara instantly regretted it. Blank walls weren't so bad in the kitchen, but in living s.p.a.ce they seemed like an accusation. She didn't want the world to come to an end before she had made some kind of mark on this place.

”You know what we have to do,” Jara said grimly to the engineer, who had followed her out of the kitchen.

”What's that?”

”We have to go to the Council and tell them what we know. They'll listen.”

Horvil's jaw dropped. He was too stunned to speak.

”Horvil, can you live with something like this on your shoulders?” she bellowed. She started to pace, Natch-like. ”I mean, deceiving greedy fiefcorp masters is one thing. Even deceiving Primo's. But what about those people out there who are going to suffer the consequences?” Jara's sweeping gesture encompa.s.sed the London commuters visible from the window. The multied businesspeople hustling to meetings, the families scampering across the square looking for safety, the street performers in the midst of some apocalyptic pantomime at the foot of Big Ben. ”What if the medical networks break down? What if the multi network collapses? What if this black code attack sparks a total panic? What if people die, for process' preservation?”

The engineer coc.o.o.ned himself in a ball on Jara's couch, as if his voluminous stomach might provide some insulation against the calamities of the world. ”But ... but ... I'm sure that Natch wouldn't-that he didn't ...”

Jara refused to give any ground. ”I don't know how he's involved in this. Maybe he heard a rumor on the Data Sea weeks ago. Maybe he had a hand in putting this black code together. But he knows something. We can't just ignore that, Horvil! We can't just let people die! The Council might need Natch's information to help stop the attack.” I know Natch has been your best friend practically since birth, Horv, but sometimes you've got to look out for your own a.s.s. Do you think Natch cares one way or the other what happens to you? ”Horvil, there comes a point where we have to put this Primo's nonsense behind us and think of the people out there.”

The engineer was starting to crack. ”All I ever wanted was to be a bio/logic engineer,” he whimpered, as if this were the most relevant statement in the world. ”All I ever wanted to do was help people.” He peered up at this pint-sized woman with the ma.s.s of curly hair standing over him, but there was no mercy forthcoming.

Can't you see that I'm trying to help you, Horv?

Don't you realize this could be just what we need to do to get out of these miserable apprentices.h.i.+p contracts?

And then Horvil narrowed his eyes, puzzled. The color gushed back to his face all at once. He looked as if his tongue was struggling to catch up with the information in his head. Finally, the engineer shook his head violently, banished the display on the viewscreen with an outstretched hand, and summoned forth the craggy visage of Sen Sivv Sor.

BLACK CODE ATTACKS OVER.

Defense and Wellness Council to Make Statement

Jara could afford only one outgoing multi stream at her apartment, and it would have taken too long for Horvil to physically traipse back to his place on the other side of London. So the engineer had to rush down the street to the nearest public multi facility, something he hated to do. He didn't care how many times the Council guaranteed the safety of these public connections and how many guards they posted; you could never really feel comfortable letting your body stand slack in a room full of strangers while your mind was off elsewhere. Life in the world of meat and bone could be so inconvenient.

Apparently, word of the Council's impending statement had hit the streets. People started vanis.h.i.+ng throughout the block as they slid into multivoid and prepared to open new connections. Horvil arrived at the public multi facility just in time to claim the last open red tile. He breathed a sigh of relief, and stepped into the s.p.a.ce between a fat j.a.panese businesswoman and a wiry Indian man who seemed to be a technician of some kind.

”We didn't have to multi over here,” said an amused Jara when Horvil finally caught up to her in the crowd. ”We could have stayed at my place and watched the press conference on the viewscreen.”

Horvil sniffed. ”How much fun would that be?”

They were standing in the Defense and Wellness Council's main auditorium, its public face. Everyone knew the Council had moved its real base of operations to a new compound of unknown location. The auditorium was a fat wedge that might have represented 20 percent on some vast pie chart-a number that roughly approximated the Council's public approval ratings.

Horvil had actually been here in person once, during his requisite tour of the Melbourne governmental facilities. He remembered seeing the entire city laid out before him during the descent of the arriving hoverbird craft. If he had the power to see through the dozens of hanging pennants to the west and the stretched stone wall beneath them, he could have seen the Prime Committee complex and the Congress of L-PRACGs. To the east lay the headquarters of the Creeds Coalition and the chief lobbying arms of TubeCo, GravCo, and TeleCo.

Jara pinged the Council's multi information node. ”A hundred and twelve million,” she said, gazing around at the a.s.sembled crowd of multi projections.

Horvil whistled. This black code attack had shaken people up. It looked like only twenty thousand, of course; in situations like this, the network conveniently abandoned the illusion that multi projections inhabited Cartesian s.p.a.ce. ”Any sign of Merri? Or Vigal?” he said.

”Public directory says Merri's here somewhere,” replied Jara. ”But no word on Serr Vigal. He wouldn't come out here for something like this.”

”And Natch?”

Jara looked at Horvil and shook her head with a frown.

At precisely three o'clock (London time), there was a decrescendo in the background chatter of the crowd. Lights that had been glaring at full intensity dimmed to candle strength. Horvil held his breath and watched the stage below for the towering form of High Executive Len Borda.

But the man who materialized on center stage wasn't him. A white-robed and yellow-starred figure approached the podium. The man, a pureblooded Asian, was little more than half Borda's height, and had only a third of his girth. He stood patiently for a moment, dispensing that arrogant Council stare.

Borda's underling did not give his name or rank. He simply opened his mouth and began to speak in a dead monotone. ”My word is the will of the Defense and Wellness Council,” the man said, ”which was established by the Prime Committee two hundred and fifty-two years ago to ensure the security of all persons throughout the system. The word of the Council is the word of the people.”

Horvil shuddered involuntarily. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Jara doing the same. They had heard this opening dictum thousands of times in dramas, news reports and speeches, and yet it still had the power to send ripples up and down the spine. Horvil was convinced the effect was bio/logically enhanced.

”Today, rumors have circulated on the Data Sea that the Vault was under black code attack by Pharisees,” continued the Council officer coolly, as if system-wide panic was an expected hazard; the total at the bottom of a spreadsheet column, the predictable outcome of a wellweathered formula. ”Many irresponsible words have been written about the so-called vulnerabilities of the financial system and the supposed failings of the Defense and Wellness Council.

”High Executive Borda wishes it to be known that these rumors are completely without foundation. There was no black code attack this morning.”

Even through the sound-deadening programs of the Council auditorium, Horvil could hear the murmur of a million raised voices. He remembered his pathetic sniveling at Jara's apartment, his panicked dash across London, and felt an embarra.s.sed flush cover his face. The engineer risked a peek at Jara. Her nostrils were flaring.

The anonymous Council spokesman pressed on, either oblivious to or unconcerned by the crowd's reaction. ”The attack this morning was not a product of bio/logic engineering, or of black coding skill. It required nothing more than the ability to make clever forgeries and the will to deceive.

”These forgeries of Vault security messages were designed to fool the public into believing their financial holdings were under attack. What the perpetrators hoped to accomplish with this ruse is unknown. High Executive Borda believes the forgers' goal was to sow panic in the marketplace. Suffice it to say these messages have been tracked down and eliminated.”

Jara seemed disoriented. She took a step backwards and turned her focus away from the diminutive Council spokesman, who began to recite a numbing series of technical statistics. ”I don't understand,” she ConfidentialWhispered to Horvil. ”You can't just forge a message from the Vault like that. You'd need DNA, atomic signatures, who knows what else.”

Horvil tilted his head in thought. ”It's not impossible.”

”Horv, we saw those messages. They said they were from the Vault. They looked authentic. They had valid signatures.”

The engineer smiled. The panic of the world coming to an end had already given way to the open vistas of a mathematical challenge. ”Sure, it looked authentic,” he explained. ”It's not hard to make a forgery that looks official at first glance. You could probably find black code on the Data Sea that'll do the trick. The hard part is getting people not to take that second or third glance.” Horvil summoned a virtual tablet in the air and began making sketches. ”And you could probably do the same thing with the signatures ... if you knew bio/logic encryption theory inside and out ...”

Jara cradled her head in her hands and began rocking back and forth. She interrupted Horvil's musings in mid-sentence. ”Horv, have you checked the dock at the fiefcorp in the past few hours?”

Horvil had already ventured far afield into chaos theory and fractal patterns, but Jara's question brought him back to familiar territory with a sickening thud. He shook his head.

”I can't believe we fell for this,” Jara croaked. ”Natch did it. He went ahead and launched all those programs onto the Data Sea this morning, when n.o.body was paying attention. NiteFocus 48, EyeMorph 66, everything.”

”A-and the Patels?”

”Pushed back their NightHawk release until tomorrow. Routine last minute error-checking, their channelers are saying.”

There was a very easy syllogism to follow here, even for someone who had not studied subaether physics and advanced bio/logic calculus like Horvil had. Natch had spread rumors of a black code attack.... There was such an attack, or at least a fake one.... The attack had created confusion in the marketplace.... Horvil didn't want to solve the problem. He wanted the whole thing to disappear, to vanish like the multi pedestrians on the street had vanished.

But the Defense and Wellness Council spokesman had no such hesitations. ”The perpetrators of this crime may not have launched an actual attack on the Vault,” he said, his voice preternaturally calm. ”But nevertheless there has been an attack-an attack on the people's a.s.sumption of safety and security. And that is something the Council cannot abide.”

On cue, a row of ghostly figures materialized behind the spokesman. Council officers all, adorned with the white robe and yellow star, steely dartguns holstered at their waists, the inexorable mastery of the Data Sea written on their brows.

”This disruption has been thwarted, as all attacks against the public welfare are thwarted,” continued the small Asian at the van guard of the officers. ”To the perpetrators of this act, let me say this: ”The Council will not forget. The Council will not forgive. The Council will bring you to justice.”