Page 53 of Final Exit

“Something else.” At his questioning look, she conceded, “I don’t like having my exits blocked off. Especially at EXIT headquarters.” She waved toward the computer monitor. “You really think we can get any useful information out of that?”

“We may not have the resources of the FBI behind us at the moment. But I’m pretty good at old-fashioned Internet searches. Let’s see what we can find on Porter and Simmons. And I should check my email to see if Gannon came through with the background report I requested on two of my agents. If they’re not really agents, which is what I suspect, knowing more information on them might give us some leads to follow, too.”

“Gannon? I thought you two weren’t talking these days?”

“I called him from the house in Boulder and appealed to his sense of honor. Basically, the idea of mercenaries potentially impersonating federal officers was more abhorrent than speaking to me.”

“I really don’t like this former friend of yours.”

He smiled.

“I’m thinking we should search for info on your boss, too,” she said. “What did you say his name was?”

“Faegan.” He powered up the computer. “The mainframe is still here, on the first floor. But it’s been wiped clean aside from the operating system and the programs that control things like the lights and air-conditioning. It will be destroyed along with the building.”

“Destroyed? Mainframes are crazy expensive. Why not sell it?”

“Because even though some of the top geeks in the industry were paid a hell of a lot of money to ensure that none of the data that was ever stored on the hard drives is capable of being recovered, we can’t take that chance. While there’s no way to guarantee that someone won’t try to start up something similar to EXIT again sometime in the future, we can at least do everything in our power to ensure they don’t have a head start. Cyprian’s massive databases are gone. Destroyed. The backups included. See for yourself.”

He motioned her to take a seat behind the desk and she did. The familiar logon screen she’d been using her entire career as an Enforcer was displayed. The same screen she and others still used to communicate through an encrypted network. It was the same network where they’d been given their mission plans, and sometimes, EXIT orders—which contained the details about some criminal or terrorist they were supposed to target.

She keyed her login and password and pressed Enter.

An error message popped up on the screen saying that the login was invalid.

“Only administrator IDs work from this system.” He leaned over her shoulder and entered an ID and password.

The screen popped up a menu unlike anything she’d ever seen. None of the options looked familiar. At the top, it read, ISPF Primary Option Menu. Tabs under that had labels like Utilities and Compilers. And down the left side of the screen were even more choices, starting at 0 for Settings, then 1 for View, 3 was another Utilities option, and there were many more.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “What is this?”

“Essentially, it’s a user interface to the operating system. Choose option three dot four.”

“Three dot four?”

He leaned over her and keyed 3.4 and pressed Enter. “There, it gives you a place to look at all of the files on the system. Press Enter again, without filling out anything else on the screen.”

She did, and it came up with a message saying no files were found. “Does that mean the computer is empty? The mainframe doesn’t have anything on it?”

“Pretty much. Technically it means nothing exists on the system that starts with my ID as the prefix, since we’re logged onto my account. But if you type a tick mark, then A, followed by a wildcard it will show you all of the files starting with the letter A. You can do that for any letter and—”

She held her hands up in surrender. “Okay, okay. So I’m not as good with computers as I thought I was ’cause you’re speaking a language I don’t understand. But I was on the old Enforcer network just last week. Are you saying that’s been disabled since then?”

“Not exactly. I can access that system from here, but the data that drives most of it is static. And if you were to try to maneuver around the whole system the way you used to, you’d find a lot of the links no longer work. That’s because we only kept a shell running, just enough to allow communications, really. There isn’t anything you or the others can access now about old missions or any sensitive data. All of that was destroyed. Basically, the front end remains to fool the Enforcers who still haven’t been caught.”

“And that front end is run from this building?”

He shook his head. “It’s run from an FBI lab outside the city. I can log onto it from here, but most of the remaining administrative functions have to be accessed from a terminal hardwired in the lab, not remotely. If you were hoping to find all of the FBI’s secrets and an org chart showing who’s calling the shots on the Enforcer retraining mission, then I have to disappoint you. That kind of information just isn’t here.”

She sat back. “Earlier you mentioned your research on the Enforcers. Like finding all of my properties.”

“Except the one in Canada?” he teased.

“Right. Except that one. Where is all that research?”

He straightened and stepped back from the desk. “You’re a task driver and a half.”

“Sorry, can’t help it. I’m curious.”

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