A representation of the personality package was floating in one of the terminal's cubes, a dark green sphere with a multi-segmented surface, reminding her of an insect eye.
She began to type on the terminal, summoning up a finance transfer order, then entered Leol Reiger's Zurich bank account number, reading it direct from his profile.
You're giving Leol Reiger ten thousand Eurofrancs? her grandfather asked.
That's right. She watched the representation of the transfer order form in the cube, a translucent blue starfish. Easiest way I know of accessing the bank's mainframe. The arms of the starfish were closing around the personality package.
Bloody hell, I don't know what the world's coming to.
There was no sign of the intricately nicked green sphere; its surface had been covered by a smooth blue shell. Julia tested the assembled composite with a couple of security probe programs. Its integrity held.
You know a better way? she asked.
No. A mental sigh accompanied the admission.
Right, then. She tapped the download key, and the data composite squirted into Leol Reiger's Zurich bank.
Julia made a brief kissing motion after it. There was a nostalgic thrill in watching it go. She hadn't done any serious hotrodding for years. If only the conspiracy theorists knew. Julia Evans's hobby was criminal data piracy. They'd have a field day with that one.
She could have routed the request through Victor's division, put pressure on the bank to squirt over Leol Reiger's account data. Corporate entities did co-operate to a reasonable degree, especially with regard to tekmercs. But Zurich banks still clung to their independence. It would take a lot of pressure, and time.
A hiss of compressors penetrated the window. She turned to see the Pegasus carrying Victor Tyo and Dr Parnell lifting off the lawn. The scene looked vaguely surreal, like something out of a five-star resort advert; all it lacked was a couple of smiling models posing at a table by the pool, sipping something potent and cool.
Julia ran her hands through her hair, and turned back to the terminal. Time to find out just how widespread the knowledge of atomic structuring was. With at least two other groups chasing after Royan, she was starting to wonder exactly how many routes there were to the alien.
The terminal accessed Event Horizon's main communication network for here and she loaded a cut-off program at the junction. If anyone tried to backtrack her call the best they'd be able to come up with was English Telecom's Peterborough exchange. She entered the Gracious Services number.
There was no phone on the other end; England's hacker circuit had illegal catchment programs loaded into every exchange in the country. It pulled out her call and plugged her straight in.
There was a nervous flicker across her terminal's flatscreen, then it printed:
WELCOME TO GRACIOUS SERVICES.
WE AIM TO PLEASE
DATA FOUND, OR MONEY RETURNED.
NO ACCESS TOO BIG OR TOO SMALL.
JUST REMEMBER OUR CARDINAL RULE:
DO NOT ASK FOR CREDIT!!!
PLEASE ENTER YOUR HANDLE.
Julia thought for a moment; she hadn't actually used the circuit from this side before. Royan had signed her on as a novice hotrod when he was teaching her to write dark programs, saying the experience would do her good. She had run several burns against various companies and government departments, competing against the other hotrods for the client's money. It was a race, the one who pulled the data first cleaned up, minus the umpire's cut. Competition sharpened her mind to a considerable degree.
She grinned furtively and typed: MARIE ANTOINETTE.
GOOD AFTERNOON, MARIE ANTOINETTE YOUR
UMPIRE IS BLUEPRINCE. WHAT SERVICE DO YOU REQUIRE?
BULLETIN BOARD.
ALL RIGHT MARIE ANTOINETTE, THERE ARE ELEVEN
HOTRODS PLUGGED IN, AND EACH OF THEM HAS A
MEMORY CORE LOADED WITH BASEBORN BYTES. WHAT
DO YOU WANT TO KNOW?
ONE) HOW MANY COMPANIES ARE PLUGGED INTO ATOMIC STRUCTURING TECHNOLOGY?
TWO) ARE ANY OF THEM IN POSSESSION OF THE THEORY FOR CONSTRUCTING A NUCLEAR FORCE GENERATOR?
THREE) WHAT IS THE ORIGIN OF ATOMIC STRUCTURING TECHNOLOGY? I WILL ACCEPT ORIGIN RUMOURS IF HARD FACTS ARE UNAVAILABLE.
Her message stayed on the flatscreen for over a minute before it cleared.
I'M NOT QUITE SURE WHAT YOU WANT US FOR, MARIE ANTOINETTE, SIX HOTRODS HADN'T EVEN HEARD OF ATOMIC STRUCTURING. AND THOSE THAT DO SAY THEIR BYTES AREN'T GOING TO COME CHEAP. ATOMIC STRUCTURING IS THE BIGGEST ULTRA-HUSH TECHNOLOGY SINCE EVENT HORIZON CRACKED THE GIGACONDUCTOR.
"And don't I know it," she murmured, then typed: I UNDERSTAND BLUEPRINCE. DEAL FOR ME, PLEASE.
OK, THEY DONT HAVE MUCH, SO WHAT THEY'LL DO IS POOL WHAT THEY HAVE GOT. I'LL TABULATE FOR YOU, BUT IT'S A FLAT FEE SIXTY THOUSAND POUNDS NEW STERLING EACH, AND YOU TAKE THE RISK THAT THE DATA IS REPLICATED FIVE TIMES. ARE YOU STILL INTERESTED?
I'M INTERESTED.
YOU CHOSE YOURSELF A GOOD HANDLE, MARIE ANTOINETTE. PLEASE DEPOSIT THREE HUNDRED THOUSAND POUNDS NEW STERLING INTO TIZZAMUND BANK, ZURICH, ACCOUNT NUMBER WRU2384ASE.
You're not actually going to pay them, are you, Juliet? Her grandfather asked.
Her hands poised over the terminal keys. "Fraid so. I need to know how widespread this knowledge is. And I need to know quickly. This is the simplest way. Whatever information is floating around, the circuit will have plugged into it. They're very good, you know.
I wish I still had a bed. I wouldn't have bothered getting out of it this morning. Actually paying these criminals, bloody hell in my day they would have been rounded up and forced to hand the information over. Cattle prods wouldn't come amiss.
Julia giggled and authorized the credit transfer from one of her Cayman slush funds.
YOUR CREDIT IS STAGGERING, MARIE ANTOINETTE. I HOPE IT WAS WORTH IT. HERE'S YOUR BULLETIN:
THE FOLLOWING COMPANIES ARE NOW KNOWN TO POSSESS THE BEHAVIOURAL EQUATIONS OF THE STRONG NUCLEAR FORCE: DASTEIN, JOHNA THANHEWIT SEIMENS, BOEING, MUTIZEN, MITSUBISHI, SPARAVIZ, RENAULT GLOBECAST HONDA, GENERAL ELECTRIC, EVENT HORIZON, EMBRAER, SMB, MIKOYAN, AND ROCKWELL. IN ADDITION, THE DEFENCE MINISTRIES OF THE FOLLOWING COUNTRIES ARE ALSO IN POSSESSION OF THE BEHAVIOURAL EQUATIONS: AUSTRALIA, BRAZIL, CHINA, CANADA, ENGLAND, FRANCE, GERMANY, JAPAN, RUSSIA, USA, SOUTH AFRICA, AND TAIWAN. THE SENIOR STAFF OF ALL SEVEN MAJOR DEFENCE ALLIANCES HAVE NOW BEEN INFORMED OF THE EXISTENCE OF THE EQUATIONS, AND THEIR IMPLICATIONS.
Julia sat up in the chair, consternation acting like a static charge crawling over her skin. Dear Lord, can you read that, Grandpa?
Too bloody true I can read it, Juliet. What the hell do those prats in commercial intelligence think they're pissing about at? Are they on strike, for Christ's sake?
I don't know, she told him wearily. We never heard even a whisper, nothing. And why hasn't the English MOD been in contact with us?
AS TO THE ORIGIN OF THE ORIGINAL EQUATIONS:
TWO-THIRDS OF THE COMPANIES LISTED ARE KNOWN TO HAVE BEEN APPROACHED BY GLOBECAST. THEY WERE OFFERED A PARTNERSHIP IN THE MARKETING AND PRODUCTION OF ATOMIC STRUCTURING TECHNOLOGY IN RETURN FOR GLOBECAST PROVIDING THEM WITH THE GENERATOR THEORY. MOST OF THE SUBSEQUENT DEALS BEING STRUCK BETWEEN COMPANIES ARE CONCERNED WITH SHARING THE DEVELOPMENT COSTS OF SUCH A GENERATOR. THIS WOULD IMPLY THAT GLOBECAST IS IN SOLE POSSESSION OF THE THEORY WHICH WILL ALLOW CONSTRUCTION OF THE NUCLEAR FORCE GENERATOR. I HOPE THAT'S WHAT YOU WANTED TO SEE, MARIE ANTOINETTE.