Page 62 of Coldwire
“Is everything all right?” I ask. I typeThank you Blare I’ve got itand disconnect, clearing my searches on the main controller.
“It’s fine,” Nik says. He’s barely able to get the words out past his gritted teeth. “The file is righthere, but”—he puts his hands in front of him, making it seem as though he wants to strangle the server box—“naturally, everything is encrypted.”
“Blare seems like a quick hacker.”
“Blare has a certain skill for stubbornly chasing down rabbit holes, but decryption takes more power. Servers are usually duplicated for redundancies too, which makes files easier to retrieve, but there’s onlyoneversion of this, and the compute of handhelds alone will requiredays….”
He yanks his handheld out of the port. For a second, he appears to be giving up, calling it quits before we’re caught so that there will be the opportunity to regroup and find another method.
I’m mistaken. Nik leans closer to run a palm along the rack in front ofhim, counting the blinking blue lights. When he pulls at one of the lower boxes, he’s only examining the outer casing at first.
Then he’s hauling the box all the way out, attempting to heft its weight into his arms.
“Whoa, whoa,” I say, hurrying over. “Not with your handheld still in your grip. You’re going to drop everything….”
I take his handheld from him. Nik jolts immediately, which makes him loosen his hold on the server and fumble it. It’s more an instinctive response than deliberate nosiness when I glance at his unlocked screen, finding a chat log with two tabs open.I hope I’ll see you soonis the last message someone sent, and that doesn’t seem like it came from Blare. Before I can glimpse anything else, auto-lock kicks in and turns the screen dark.
“Be careful with that,” he warns, regaining his hold on the server box. He shifts to adjust its weight and pulls the entire hardware into his arms.
I blink. “Are we stealing the server?”
“Yes,” he grunts. “We need time to decrypt it before we can retrieve the file. Grab Miz on the way out, would you?”
16LIA
“I assume this is for you.”
Kieren holds out the smaller jumpsuit of the two yellow delivery driver uniforms. The doors were left unlocked. Even the engine was still running, so we didn’t have to figure out where the keys were or how they turned.
“I’m just going to wear this on top of everything,” I say, gesturing for him to hand it over. “It clashes terribly with my hair.”
He pauses, midway through pulling open his own jumpsuit. “Your hair is black.”
“I know. That was my way of insulting the jumpsuit for being ugly.”
I make a small hop, freeing the tight ankle hem caught around my shoe before I zip up snugly. NileCorp has gone the extra mile of attaching badges to the belt line with a picture of me smiling. I don’t think I ever posed for that photo, so I assume they generated it on their own.
A small pop-up appears in my display.
This is an automated message: Hurray, you’ve made it to the truck! Remember deliveries go in through the side entrance. —Kam
“Do you want to drive?” I ask.
Kieren’s already getting into the driver’s seat. “I feel like we’re completing quests in a video game.”
“I suppose that’s not so far off from the point of an exam posting.”
Kieren makes a grand show out of checking the mirrors and putting the truck into reverse. With only a small shift on the wheel, though, the vehicle easily pulls itself out from around the corner, then rumbles toward the gate and turns in. I press up against my window in search of the facility’s side door, only the truck is turning again, taking itself to the walkway on the left. The route is loaded in already.
“See, this is what I mean,” Kieren mutters. He doesn’t want to trigger any listening ears on the dashboard’s recording capabilities. “No way they’re this prepared without someone who’s already been in and out of this facility.”
The truck comes to a halt at the data center’s side entrance. I only make a pensive noise, stepping out and tugging my jumpsuit straight.
I go to open the back, pushing the doors wide and browsing the packages for something we could convincingly deliver. I shouldn’t have bothered—there’s another pop-up, a request for an augmented plug-in to make some changes to my vision. While Kieren calls, “Are we supposed to accept this?” I’ve already hit accept. Two of the cardboard boxes in front of me light up with a white glow.
“I’m taking the smaller box,” I announce when he comes around. “Use yours to block your face.”
“Rude,” Kieren mutters. He picks up the package with more strength than necessary—it must be empty inside given how he almost flies back, his balance faltering for a few seconds before he steadies himself.
