Sync (part 2)

by Nick Rolynd

(Part 1)

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Silence.

“Who the hell are you?”

She blinks. “E.”

“E?”

“E.”

“E?”

“Yes, E.”

“The letter?”

“No, the other E.”

“What? What the–? Just–No! Stop it! I don’t care what your name is!”

She quirks an eyebrow. “Then why did you ask?”

“That wasn’t what I meant!”

“Then why did you say it?”

“I…” He shakes his head. “Stop messing with me!”

“Aw, but it’s funny.”

“Why are you in my office?” He yells.

“I broke in,” she says, as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

“You…” His briefcase falls to the floor, forgotten. “You broke into an office on the eighty-fifth floor of a guarded government building?”

“Yep.” She hops onto his desk and crosses her legs, fingers tapping on the plastic surface.

Rex stares. Lost. So very, very lost. “How?”

She tilts her head to the side, dark bangs falling into her face. “Sneaked past the lazy guards, disabled all the security cameras, cracked the key codes on all the doors, and waltzed into your office without a single person seeing me.” She holds up the damned piece of paper. “You forgot this, by the way.”

“Yes, I know.” He can’t think of anything smarter to say. What can you say to some master hacker-spy-person that can break into a guarded building like it’s child’s play? Or is it child’s play? He takes a good long look at E. Young. Teenager young. Short. Slim. Dressed all in black. Black boots–leather. Black pants–denim. Sheer black loose hoodie revealing a tight black tank top underneath, its sleeves tucked into long leather fingerless gloves that extend all the way up to her elbow’s–black gloves.

If he didn’t know any better, he’d guess she was some poison punk groupie. But they were usually high or drunk and raving about the latest screaming-at-the-top-of-his-lungs middle-aged singer. Not breaking into government buildings. Definitely not breaking into government buildings.

“You just compared me to some unsavory group of people, didn’t you?”

He stiffens. “What?”

“I can see it on your face.” Sharp blue eyes bore into his own. “Every thought that goes through your head.” Her pitch rises to an eerie soprano. “Who the hell is this E person? She looks like a member of ‘insert unsavory group of city dwellers here‘. But no, that can’t be right. Those people aren’t smart. Those people are capable. But if E isn’t one of them, then who the hell is she?“

Her voice drops. “Close?”

His voice wavers. “Dead on.”

“Funny thing about people. They always think they can hide their thoughts, their intentions. But you all wear your every idea, every notion, every emotion, right on your sleeves for others to read.” She smacks the desk. “Granted, most of your peers are far too blind to actually be able to read other people, but the information is right there.”

“You some kind of expert, are you?”

“The best of the best.”

“Right, then. So, who are you now?”

The eyebrow quirks again. “E, remember?”

“That’s not–”

“Then say what you mean and not what you say.”

“What?”

“Oh, for your Gods’ sakes. Just ask me what I want from you.” She twirls a finger in the air. “It’s that simple.”

He flounders. “Uh, ah…what do you want from me?”

She claps. He jumps. “Glad you asked, Rex!” She slides off the desk and picks up a–predictably–black bag. “You’re heading to a meeting, yeah?”

“Yes…”

“With Governor Maybeth, yeah?”

“Yes…”

“And you sit right next to him, yeah?”

“Yes…”

“Good! This’ll be easy, then!” She unclasps the bag and removes a green computer case, unzipping it to reveal a thin, silver laptop. “This is an exact replica of Maybeth’s personal computer. Down to the same number of scratches and scuffs in the same exact places. The only difference is the hard drive. His is filled with top secret information. This one is rigged to produce a fatal error the moment it’s booted up.”

Rex stares, uncomprehending.

“See, this,” she waves the laptop around, “would be entirely unnecessary if Maybeth wasn’t such a paranoid asshat. But because he is–and apparently with good reason, considering I’m here, but he doesn’t know about us, so it’s really unfounded paranoia–anyway, his computer is non-networked and lacks internet capabilities, meaning it’s completely unable to be broken into from the outside. You actually need the computer in order to see what’s on the computer. And, of course, Maybeth never parts with it. He always takes it with him. All the time. Everywhere.“

Pause.

“So! What to do? What to do?” Her eyes roll in a complete circle, landing right back on him.

A deep, black pit forms in Rex’s stomach.

She grins. She sees it.

“Exactly! This is where you come in, Rex! Once Maybeth takes the floor to give his required speech of the day, I want you to drop your pen or a paper or something, bend over to pick it up, and while your out of sight, switch Maybeth’s laptop for this one. Then, after the meeting–because Maybeth never actually uses his computer during a meeting–I want you to bring the laptop to me. I’ll be waiting at that coffee shop down the street.”

Rex’s mouth hangs open.

“Simple, right?”

[to be continued]