Hack.

Hack.

Book 01 – Alpha

D Shipway

http://hack.FLIMgeeks.com

Published by D Shipway at Smashwords

Copyright 2012 D Shipway

Other works:

Dream Hackers

Monster Hackers

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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List Contents *.* /toc

1.0 - ASSASSIN

2.0 - ARRESTED

3.0 - AVENGER

4.0 - AFFLICTION

5.0 - ARENA

6.0 - ALTRUISM

7.0 - AFFECTION

8.0 - ADDICTION

9.0 - ANNIHILATION

0.0 - ADDENDUM

"Take this kiss upon the brow! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow - You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream."

- Edgar Allan Poe - A Dream Within A Dream

"Woe to him who lives in this city! For here, peace is a shadow -- and shame, the daily bread. Where is the dream -- the bright star of hope? Here it lies stillborn -- entombed forever -- dead before it’s time."

- Jack Kirby - The Eternals #8

1.0 – Assassin

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[Welcome, Alexander]

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I rarely, if ever, look for trouble. Somehow, some way it always seems to find me. My greatest skill is the innate ability to turn any simple, straightforward situation into a total ass-backwards debacle. It’s not a skill I pride myself on, but a talent nonetheless.

I rub the sides of my mug, hoping to re-establish some warmth in the coffee, but it’s a lost cause. Even if it wasn’t ice cold it’d be stale and miserable. I take a suspicious sip, and promptly spit it back into the mug with an I-deserved-that sneer.

My foot has fallen asleep again. I lift my heavy shoes off the desk and they hit the floor with a double thud that rattles around the room. I need to get my blood pumping, especially to my brain.

This is the perfect opportunity to pace.

There are different kinds of pacing, based on variations of posture, speed, and whether it’s accompanied by hand-wringing. I debate the merits of my own anticipation, and decide on 'anxious, yet aloof' pacing. It’s a pensive, thought-provoking, staving off boredom routine.

My office is small, so the route is short but functional. I re-examine the photographs that have been there so long I don’t even remember putting them up. Sincere thanks from starlets who spelled my name wrong, and autographs from pseudo-celebrities -- some of which are real. The ceiling fan above me puts a half-assed effort into annoying me with a low creak, and its shadow dances against the blinds in the window.

It’s all so damn stereotypical and cliché. I’ve tried to infuse my own awkward sense of style into the place. Liven it up, perhaps, or at least give it a pulse. No, being in the City always finds a way to smear everything into a fine paste of conformity. Everyone shares their own custom-designed world here. Even the most personal of details end up being run of the mill, par for the course, and just as special as everybody else.

I turn to the door, and see her shadowy hourglass shape through the frosted glass of the door. She’s a sexy silhouette between the narrow, backwards letters of my name and profession. The words are in Comic Sans font. I hate Comic Sans, and it almost ruins the appeal. It's a small victory that my name’s spelled correctly.

C. D. Alexander. Private Investigator, Security, Assassin.

Without pausing to read the door, or even knocking politely, she walks in. She’s easy to look at. I can tell she gets plenty of attention wherever she goes, and has gotten used to it. She wears admiration around her shoulders like a feather boa as she struts into the office with confidence, sexuality and all the right moves. Her perfume smacks me in the face with musk and sultry undercurrent of vanilla. I can tell she’s as far from sweet as she is from hideously ugly. This is the kind of woman you refer to as a bombshell, and if my information was accurate she was bound to drop bombs of another kind on me.

My information is never wrong.

You must be Alexander, she says, as she slowly eyes me from my beaten leather shoes, to my rumpled trench-coat, and up to my even more rumpled hair.

I respond in kind by looking her up and down, and try to hide how much I enjoy what I see. I clear my throat and hope it sounds as gruff and masculine as I intend, That’s me. And you must be Emmanuelle. I’ve been waiting for you.

More than you know, she says. Before I can furrow my brow at the odd remark, she continues without missing a beat. If you know who I am, then you may know the kind of -- services I require.

I can’t stop staring at the little spot between her top lip and the bottom of her nose. And if you’re talking to me, I can narrow it down to the three fields I do best. I assume it’s the killing-people-quite-efficiently that you’d be looking into.

You really don’t waste any time, she says with the end of her intricately designed lips turning up at the corner. I like that.

Just one of many redeeming qualities I exude, I say. It had sounded better in my head. Her shoulders tense at the awkwardness. I reel it in and continue, So what, in particular, can I help you with?

She blinks her beguiling, green eyes at me and I feel myself warm a degree or two. It’s nothing terribly difficult. A long-range hit on someone who’s compulsively ordinary. You should have his routine figured out within minutes, and he’ll tell you his entire life-story if you talk to him for more than three sentences. She hands me a small, oblong thumb-drive, On here is his basic profile information. You should be able to get any other details you need yourself. You’ll also find a throwaway message box you can contact me at. More likely I will contact you when I need to.

Anything else? I wonder if I've packed enough sarcasm into the phrase, but I don’t think my facial expressions convey the right tone.

No. Although there may be some -- further excitement if this is handled well.

I’m not sure she meant it as suggestive as I think, so I limit my response to simple nod. She turns to walk out of the office, and I watch her curves as she does.

Someone who looks that good and asks me for help is bound to get me into more trouble than I can imagine. Not a problem, Emmanuelle. You’ll hear from me --

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ENDFILE: THE CITY

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WAKEUP

My wrist flashes and vibrates in waves of startling annoyance. I blink and my eyes squint at the flaming pain in my temples. I swipe my finger across the electronic display embedded in my forearm. Only messages from my wife are programmed with such high priority. The screen lights up and the message that was so important to require my immediate attention and couldn’t be ignored filled the small screen. The words are underlined, ending with only a couple exclamation points. Your sons have shit themselves. They insist on your attendance. Love, Anne

I never thought that would be a phrase that could make me smile.

The system powers down with a keystroke, and I push away from the desk with both hands.

It’s always jarring, to say the least, when logging off of the virtual world and stepping back into the real world version. The artificial vibrancy and systematic order of every tiny detail tends to diffuse the senses when chaotic, mundane reality takes over again. They call it ‘The Numbs’ and it’s why the Officially Licensed Manufacturer recommends you minimize your sessions on the Nets to four hours or less, insisting on a good ten minute ‘adjustment period’ before returning to reality. Like asking the gambler if he’s had enough after the mandatory twelve hour period, this is a recommendation, a mild threat at best that’s never enforced.

I dig out the earpiece from my inner ear but don’t put it back in the drawer just yet. I’ll be going back into the virtual world to get back to work soon enough. This kind of small bud used to be for audio, now it provides a direct connection to my balance centre. I think about how the simplest, most innocuous technology evolves, and a small shiver runs down my back.

I hated cell phones. I hated how they made it fashionable to be rude in whatever company you were in. As if the other conversation was automatically more important because it was over a distance. I hated the status symbol music players, based more on stylish impulse and ‘what the rest of the flock was buying’ than affordability or practical use. I still vaguely remember what it was like to have a camera that only took pictures.

Now, this. The Comm.

This is the connection to the Nets & the VirT, directly into my nervous system in the height of cyborg fashion. It replaced the cell phone. It replaced the mobile, personal computer. It is the single most comprehensive device one could ever own -- at least that’s what the commercials say.

I still remember the commercials, running in loops on every channel. "The future is brought to you by EverLiving! Tired of charging batteries? Ever lost your phone? Never be without a connection again. Introducing ‘Communicate’. The latest breakthroughs in wetware from your mobile company of choice, meets the latest immersion system, ‘Otaku’, by a joint venture between EverLiving and its Japanese subsidiary Akumabito. Connecting you to the Nets in a new, exciting way you’ve never experienced before. The VirT: more real than reality. (See a full list of potential side effects and complications at ILoveEverLivingTech dot com)"

It’s the kind of device that I, like most people, would’ve shuddered to think of only a few years ago. Just another idea out of a science fiction matinee that’s become commonplace. An embedded LED screen taking up most of my forearm up to my wrist. Three subcutaneous buttons push up on my wrist like zits with an inner glow.

This is the unsettling standard. This is what ‘Everyone’ uses. The whole world, at least all the parts of the world that matter, is implanted with these horrorshow gadgets. Constant connectivity and the height of technology. The whole process only slightly more complicated than getting a boring tattoo.

The screen on my forearm begins to itch, as usual. I trace a fingernail around the edges, subconsciously looking for redness of infection or some exposed part of my inner flesh -- also known as trying to find an excuse to have the device checked, fixed, or somehow removed.

As I scratch the itchy cyber-annoyance that I purposely had inflicted upon me, it flashes and lights up again. The vibration startles me for a split second before I react and swipe the screen. ‘Wrist deep in poop. Help.’

So much for downtime. Off to help with the Monsters.

My studio, laboratory, man-cave, and home office all rolled into one is affectionately named ‘The Pit’. At some point in the past it had served its function as a garage, separate from the house at the end of the driveway. In my precocious teens it was where I played in a band, while it still had enough of the properties to make it a garage. A couple renovations later and it was a bedroom, before it was overhauled again into a high-tech, high-fashion office for my work. At least the ‘IRL’ work.

It’s barely thirty steps to the back door of the house and I can already hear them wailing in stereo. Two, similarly shrill, yet distinct screams assault me from the open window. The stench follows right behind it.

My Monsters. Twins, just over a year old (I’m not one of those people who measures the age of their children in X number of months until they’re in the fourth grade).

The thought occurs to me that I’m rushing towards a horrid mess. That I would have run away in terror from only a couple years ago ,when my work was life and I wouldn’t want to get fecal matter on my tie. I used to think getting married was the biggest change in life I could handle. I used to believe a pregnant wife was the most terrifying ordeal I would ever have to deal with.

Now I grab the extra pack of wipes, just in case, on the way through the house to the impending disaster area and plunge into the scatological foray.

I’ve got Coop, I say as I grab Twin A from my wife who’s currently trying to stop the flow from both ends of Twin B.

Sure, take the one that’s less messy, says my wife, who had only slightly exaggerated her current level of filth coverage. You don’t want to sit on that chair, just yet. By the way.

This is confirmed by Doc, who stops screaming and giggles with a definite amount of pride. I find a new spot to spread out the towel on the floor and begin to find my son under the mess and the stink.

A few frantic minutes, and one thorough cleanup later, Anne replaces the hand towel she dried her hands with and turns her beautiful blue eyes to me, So, how was work?

Same old, same old. Might have a lead on a new gig, I reply. I’m still scrubbing my arms up to the elbows like a surgeon prepping for the operating room.

Got a new client?

I’m sure there’s a certain amount of ‘just being polite’ in her inquiries, but at least she cares enough to fake giving a fuck about most of what I do. It’s part of the reason I love this one. She has the uncanny ability to sit in silence with me without it being uncomfortable in any way. Her eyes are two more reasons I married her. I found someone who can put up with my shit on a regular basis and she just happens to have beautiful eyes.

Yeah, I answer, quickly deciding how much information is pertinent, and how much would only serve to raise her ire. Some woman with a grudge needs someone’s avatar retired. Not sure what the motives are. More importantly the credit advance came through.

Good. She sighs, We need it. I had to call in a couple favours to keep those two in diapers this week.

Free-range children it is. I stroke her cheek, and offer my most reassuring smile, I’ll set up a pen in the backyard. They can fertilize the grass, and learn some valuable lessons about living off the land.

Getting cold out there, with winter on the way. She pauses, gives me light kiss on the cheek, then turns back to rejoin the Monsters in the living room, I better start teaching them how to start a fire with a couple sticks.

I dig out the pots and pans from beneath the stove, thinking of ways to hide vegetables in the boys’ food. My mind quickly dances from subject to subject until I’m thinking about the alluring woman who visited my office, and all those wonderful curves of hers.

The sooner I can get supper out of the way, the sooner I can get to the hunt.

1.1

RUNPROG VirT

[prtcl01 activating]

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{Now entering: THE CITY}

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The slick, jet-black suit serves two important purposes: It’s stylish enough to pass seamlessly through the sordid night clubs of The City, and necessary camouflage for prowling shadows on rooftops and stalking the dark alleys below.

The hat? The hat is all style points.

I’ve spent so much time staring at this digitally dreary world through a rifle scope I think it’s given me selective tunnel vision. Even now the whole rain-soaked city seems to wash out of my peripheral vision, as if by sheer force of will I could make it all disappear. Every lost soul below ceases to exist; every ominous building becomes basic background geometry, nothing else matters. There is only me, and the target. The predator, and the