Mindstar Rising

"You told me someone tried to kill you," Greg said.

"Damn right, boy. Yesterday evening the NN core's inputs were blitzed, saturated with override-priority data squirts. Every cha

"So what went wrong?"

"I'm not a rational, neatly mathematical program. I fought back, began wiping their data as it came in, changed the priority codes, shut down the Event Horizon datanet—and you wouldn't believe how much that's going to cost us. They bloody nearly succeeded, though. If I'd been a Turing personality-responses program it would've been all over."

Greg was fast getting out of his depth. He remembered questioning a legion cleric his squad had captured in Turkey, a fanatical fundamentalist, so devout he didn't even acknowledge the infidel's existence: his associative-word trick had been useless. The sense of displacement was familiar. He tried to sort out some sort of priority list in his mind.

"Have you safeguarded yourself from that attack method being employed again?"

"Yes. It's a question of code encryption, I've altered my acceptance filters so that only half of my input circuits will accept priority squirts. Of course, there's nothing to stop them from thinking up new methods."

"So the problem is now centred around tracking down the source of the attack, right?"

"And eliminating it," said Walshaw.

Greg opened his eyes. "Your department."

Walshaw gave him a brief nod.

"So where did the data squirt originate from?" Greg asked.

Walshaw ran his hand through what was left of his hair. "We've no leads on that, I'm afraid. There were at least eight separate hotrods who hacked into the Event Horizon datanet, probably more, but with the shutdown we lost a lot of data. The blitz was well organised. All eight violators used multiple cut-outs to prevent us from tracing them."

"I'm surprised they got in so easily."

"Entry is no problem," said Philip Evans. "it's when you try to get our main account to transfer a million Eurofrancs to your Zurich bank or peek into research-team memory files that you run into trouble. Nobody has ever had a requirement to fend off this type of infiltration before. Its own crudity was what made it so successful."

"Crude?"

"Well, relatively."

"I'm trying to eliminate possibilities," Greg said. "It wasn't a blanket attack, was it? What I mean is, it was purposefully directed at you. They knew you were here?"

"Yes. I would say it's got to be one of those bastard kombinates. They've discovered Ranasfari cracked the giga-conductor, and they're badly worried. Anyone with a gram of sense can see the upheaval it's going to cause. Trouble is, they can't destroy it, there's no turning the clock back. Instead they've settled for the next best thing, which is yours truly. Without me Event Horizon won't be nearly as successful in marketing the stuff. They'd only have Julia and the non-existent trustees to deal with."

"So that rules out joyburners," Greg said. "They don't work in packs, anyway. How well guarded is the knowledge of your continued existence?"

"Only twelve people in the world knew," said Morgan Walshaw. "Thirteen counting yourself. That's myself, Julia, Ranasfari, and the team which grew the NN core."

"Just nine of them?" Greg asked incredulously.

"There's nothing complicated about the process," said Philip. "We've had neuro-coupling for eight years now, and the RNA splice is a standard procedure. It's only the cost of this much bioware which prevents it from becoming widespread."

"OK, next question. Would the hotrod team which launched the blitz have to be told you were here, or could they find out by analysing the data flow through Event Horizon's network?"

"They'd know the NN core was an important part of the network from observing the data flow, but that's all. Unless they were specifically told what the NN core was, the best they could guess is that it was an ordinary bioware number-cruncher loaded with a Turing personality-responses program."

"In other words, they know about you."

"Looks that way, boy."

"With only twelve people knowing about the core, I can pin down that mole for you, no messing," Greg said. "So where is the other leak liable to have come from?"

"Ministry of Defence, I hope," said Walshaw.

"Most likely," Philip Evans admitted. "Morgan here kept a tight security cordon around the giga-conductor project, but we had to co-operate with the MOD. It was on a confidential basis, of course, but leaks are inevitable on a project this big. You just have to balance the risk against the payoff."

"Two separate leaks," Morgan said. "It's an appalling lapse. One I could accept, but compromising the NN core and the giga-conductor as well, that hurts."

Greg paused, worried about what Walshaw had said, his intuition producing that a

Walshaw frowned, glancing at the black column. "We are still tracking down the actual tekmercs. They've taken a lot of trouble to cover their tracks."

"So nobody I found passed the data over?"

"No."

"Could it have been a hotrod burn which pulled the data?"

Julia cleared her throat, giving Walshaw an enquiring look. The security chief nodded reluctantly.

"To get at the monitor programs you would have to either burn straight into the security division's data core or copy the programs direct from Zanthus's 'ware," she said. "Zanthus would probably be the easiest option, but you would need to be up there to do it."

"If it was a hotrod burn," Greg mused.

"Bloody hell, boy; you're not telling me we've still got a Judas in the company?"

"There is no such thing as coincidence," Greg said soberly. "Two leaks on the two greatest ultra-hush projects Event Horizon is ru

"I said that it had to be someone familiar with our security data procedures," Julia said.

"So you did, Juliet, so you did."

Walshaw shook his head in dismay, lips drawn taut. "This means we're going to have to open the field of enquiry to include the whole security division headquarters staff, two hundred and eighty perso

"Tell you, not that many, not in the timescale we'd need. Remember, if this mole exists, he'll know we're gu

"You just said there was!" Philip sounded irritated.

"Covering my options."

"Bloody hell."

"If it is just one person, then it's going to be a very senior staff member," Walshaw said. "The security around the NN core was rock-solid, damn it."

"A staff member or an executive assistant," Greg said. "Someone who had access to financial records, and saw how much money was being spent on an ultra-hush bioware project."