29
Washington, D.C.
baby was asleep, as was Guru, and Michaels was up in bed, watching the news when the com i. He reached for it, thinking it was Toni. “Hey, boss.” The visual blossomed on the receiver, a sy hologram of a face that definitely wasn’t Toni’s. “Jay. What’s up?”
“I’ve got good news, better news, and not so good re.”
“Oh. Give me the good news first.” “I found Jackson Keller.”
“I didn’t know he was lost. Who is Jackson Keller?” “Long story. Short version: I believe he is the guy run- ig the web/net attacks.” “Good. Where can we collect him?” “Well, see, that’s the not-so-good stuff. I’m not exactly pure where he is. I know where he was, up until a few days ago, I think, but I’m pretty sure I know who he’s working for.” “And that would be …?”
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“The better news-CyberNation.”
“You’re sure about this?”
“Yep. Want me to dazzle you with my brilliance?”
“Do I have a choice?”
Jay ignored that and said, “I scanned public tax records in the U.S. and found he had paid federal taxes last year on foreign income grosses of $250,000. I checked incorporation records, and found a Delaware company called Molotov Software Programs, Inc., the president being one Jackson Keller. Apparently the vice president is his mother, the secretary-treasurer his uncle. That’s got tax- dodge or scam written all over it.
“From what I was able to determine, all of MSP’s income for the last three years came from another corporation, Systems Upgrade, Inc., which turns out to be a shell owned by Future Tense Computer Engineering, which is, when you run it down, another shell, owned lock, stock, and barrel by-ta dah!-CyberNation.
“Corporate credit cards-Visa, ME, AmEx-have been issued for MSP, Inc., from the International Bank of Zurich, and Three-Cees and TRW both say that the credit is good, which means he pays his bills on time. Without a warrant, I can’t get into real specific details on those transactions, but I’ve checked commercial usage location lists and gotten hits in southeast Florida for the last three months. Before that, he spent some time in Japan, and before that, in Germany. Apparently CyberNation owns some rolling stock and some other ships. The train carries tourists back and forth between Berlin and France, and there is some kind of repair work being done on the boat, or barge, or whatever, in Yokohama.”
“He does some traveling,” Michaels said.
“Yeah. But the south Florida thing is the deal-he goes to the same places the other programmers on the gambling boat go. Last hit was less than ten days ago, so my guess is he’s on the boat. I dunno what his connection to the CyberNation stuff in Germany and Japan is, but I’m gonna find out.”
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CYBERNATION
f “You think this is the leader of the assault team?” I’Td bet money on it, boss. He’s a programmer out of
second in his class.” “Isn’t that where you went to school?” “Yeah.”
Michaels heard something in Jay’s voice. “What?” |**I know the guy. I used to know him, anyway.” “Second in his class, you said? He must be pretty irp.”
“Not as sharp as the guy who was first in the class.” ^Ah.”
“I’m gonna dig some more. When I think I got enough a warrant, I’ll shoot it past Hang ‘Em High Harvey, then we can pin this moth to the collecting board.” I “Good work, Jay.” “Thanks, boss. Discom.”
After he broke the connection, the com chimed again. This time, it was Toni. She looked tired, but she was ing.
* “‘Hey, babe,” he said.
“Hi. I’m all settled in. I’m at the airport Hilton in Fort erdale. I’ll catch a shuttle copter to the ship in the
He would only get two passes by the location, one gong out, another one half an hour later coming back. Any ‘. than that might raise suspicion, and he did not want hat.
The road ran next to a sluggish little river that he as- umed was Ford’s Creek-he’d been on Ford’s Creek toad before, the place he was looking for was farther where Lower Woodville Road branched and an section of creek road picked up again, so that would sense. He would make a pass, drive for fifteen f minutes, then turn around and go back. From there, he’d fJteep right on going, local highway 24 east to Highway 1, then south on that all the way to New Orleans and a lit back to Florida. By mid-morning, he would be back i the ship.
But that was later. Now, he had to pay attention to what had come for.
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A few minutes later, he saw the driveway leading off to the west There weren’t any signs, but a hundred feet off the road was an eight-foot-high chain-link gate and a wooden kiosk behind it. He couldn’t see the guard in the little building, but surely there must be one.
That would be the place. What else could they have worth guarding out here?
To be certain, he would have one of CyberNation’s lease-time spysats do a pass overhead and confirm it. Or maybe they could just pull one of the CIA’s public domain views-they had covered most of the world, and had pictures of anything not considered secret that could be had just by downloading them from the Internet. Whatever. That was not his job. He only needed to get the lay of the place, a feel for the location, for when he came back.