Linscott breathed another sigh and Elaine’s eyes turned towards him. He gave her a slow, hard, look and walked out of the room shaking. As his footfalls faded she heard him dial a number on his cell phone and start talking. What happened to him next didn’t matter now. “Now, to figure out who they … Read more
The dean chose to remain in his office after he regained use of his back and leg muscles (his resignation to what happened summed up with a “You know where I am if you need me.”) Whitaker had been taken by Toller into one of the adjoining rooms and handcuffed to a chair—she left the … Read more
“Boss,” Hadaly said, her voice projected from the speakers on Elaine’s Enoch so that Frog could hear it as well. “I think that Operation Honeypot has revealed something interesting when correlated with the bitcoin transactions related to the Tango’s professors.” Elaine and Frog had crossed most of the campus between the Math buildings and the … Read more
Every lock in the entire hallway in both directions simultaneously unlatched itself after Elaine ran the KNOCK program on the Enoch. The initial gong chime produced by the program triggered a cacophony of rattling locks that chunk-chunked down the hallway across each door. The group stood stunned in front of the door they wanted to … Read more
“She won’t die, exactly,” Elaine said. “Hadaly-Actual is here and she’ll live on.” “Aren’t we obliged to at least try?” “No,” the two AI’s said in unison. “It is Hadaly’s persona, her decision,” Elaine said. “I know we don’t have time to get down to brass-tacks about the definition of what-is-alive, but right now Hadaly…Eigen … Read more
“I can’t upload a sample of the virus,” Elaine said. “It’s extremely contagious and I cannot let it escape the quarantine. I activated the Tesla-Faraday-Voynich barrier for that purpose. And the eldritch EMP generator has been at red-line since I activated the seal; it’s on a tripwire discharge failsafe. This virus is not escaping this … Read more
“Coming in loud and clear,” Frog said. “What now?” “I have established the diagnostic net,” Elaine said as she caught a rolling chair, sat in it, and then slid it across the room to another workstation. Her fingers danced across the keyboard like a concert pianist at a recital, flourishing single-handedly time-to-time to gesture in … Read more
[Vulnerable by Kyt Dotson is a short story in the Black Hat Magick series. It is the second-in-sequence after Invincible, published earlier on this blog.] — The Machine Bay beneath the basement of the Engineering Center sat in a state of potent silence. Its various machines and workbenches waited in sepulchral quiet until a single command from the … Read more
“Hadaly,” she said, “bring up any new information you’ve gathered about the students involving the cheating ring, the changes to GRE scores, and the manipulation of the graduate studies recruitment that we’ve seen. Include anything that we’re receiving from the ARG teams as part of Operation Honeypot.” “Thought you’d never ask,” Hadaly replied. Her eyes … Read more
“Well, that was cryptic,” Frog said after Tango logged out. Tango didn’t spend long on World of Warcraft, but he did spend long enough to deliver some confirmation to Hadaly about the academic cheating. He didn’t mention any upcoming meeting with the dean or why he was contacting her; instead he dropped the names of … Read more