Chapter 4 - The Logic of the Loop
The glass didn't shatter on the first strike; it turned a milky, opaque white, a hundred tiny fractures spreading out from the center like a spiderweb in a frost.
"Richard!" Ethan was running now, his leather shoes hitting the oak treads with a loud, irregular clatter. His face had lost the white, clean look of the country club; it was bright red, the veins in his throat rising like blue worms under the collar of his tennis shirt. "That’s a four-million-dollar node! The state insurance board has a continuous audit on that line! You’ll go to federal prison, you old bastard!"
Richard didn't look at him. He adjusted his stance, his left foot sliding back two inches onto the slate tile to find a anchor point, and he delivered the second strike with the full weight of his shoulders behind the iron.
The Plexiglas gave way with a sharp, plasticky pop. The bar went through the casing, striking the main fiber-optic distribution block behind the glass. A small shower of blue sparks flew out from the terminal, followed by the high-pitched, screaming wail of an uncooled transformer winding down. The fifty green lights stopped blinking. They turned a solid, unmoving amber, then they went entirely dark.
In the kitchen down the hall, three different backup generators started with a low, subterranean rumble that shook the baseboards, but the main terminal remained dead.
Ethan stopped five feet from the cabinet. His hands were shaking so hard he couldn't find the pockets of his trousers anymore. His mouth was open, his breath coming in short, dry gasps that smelled of five-hundred-dollar Scotch and old mints.
"You've killed the loop," he whispered. "The whole regional network... it’s going to route back to the Atlanta backup. It takes forty minutes to clear the authentication keys. Do you know what that does to the market value of the firm? The stock opens at nine tomorrow morning, Richard. If the node is down for more than thirty minutes, the state compliance committee can rescind the franchise."
"I know," Richard said. He laid the tire iron on top of the ruined walnut cabinet. "I read the prospectus you left on Emily’s table last Christmas. The one where you explained to her that she couldn't leave you because her name was on the corporate indemnification bond."
He turned around and looked at his son-in-law.
"You’re thirty-four, Ethan," Richard said, his voice softer now, almost gentle. "You’ve spent your whole life in rooms where the temperature is kept at sixty-eight degrees and the people are paid to tell you that your ideas are important. You think because you have an encryption key, you have an army. But an encryption key is just a number, Ethan. And a number doesn't do anything when the door gets kicked off the track."
"The sheriff..." Ethan stammered, his eyes darting toward the open front door where the fog was still rolling across the slate. "They're coming. I have the automated alert on my watch. They know when the terminal goes offline."
"They know the terminal is offline," Richard corrected him. "But they don't know why. And by the time the county supervisor gets the authorization from the regional director to enter a Class A secure site, the sun is going to be down behind the ridge."
A small sound came from the top of the stairs.
Emily was standing by the oak banister. She was wearing an old grey sweatshirt that belonged to Richard—the one from the 82nd Airborne supply depot that had the faded yellow letters across the chest. Her left eye was completely closed, the skin around the lid the color of a bruised plum, and her right hand was tucked into her sleeve to protect the fingers that had been bent back against the desk.
She looked down at the two men standing in the ruined hall.
"Dad," she said.
May you like
Richard walked past Ethan as if the man were nothing but an empty coat rack. He climbed the stairs, his heavy leather boots leaving small grey circles of mud on the polished oak treads. When he reached the landing, he didn't hug her. He didn't say her name. He took her left arm—the good one—and pulled it over his shoulder, his right arm coming around her waist to take the weight off her left side where the ribs were clicking against each other.
"Let’s go, Emily," he said. "The ham’s getting cold."
