//------------------------------// // Chapter 61 - Another Mystery // Story: The Freelancers // by OverHeart //------------------------------// “Access, I have a question.” The Netrunner nearly jumped out of his skin with fright, nearly putting another dent the barely working refrigerator. “Seriously Snowy, again?” “You did imply I should, as you put it, let myself in whenever I needed something.” the Synth replied. “Has that changed, perhaps I should announce my presence with a little light fanfare?” “Fine, fine, you said you wanted something?” “Am I to understand you’re able to procure software, say, for Synths?” “Did our little corpo princess not keep up with her updates, or does the tin pony want a new parlor trick or two?” Access chuckled. “Depends what you need, I’m a Netrunner, not a Techie.” “A few targeting upgrades, awareness and sensor upgrades, maybe a bit of a tune up.” Snowy remarked. “I fear our little excursion to the badlands might’ve caused some accelerated wear and tear. The young miss is a little air-headed you see, or she’d have me seen to herself.” “Must be a busy mare in general then.” Access said sarcastically, pointing to a spot in the living room next to his terminal. “Go stand over there and I’ll see what I have for you, and fair warning, the software is gonna be stolen or pirated, maybe both.” “I expected nothing less.” If the synthetic had any self-preservation protocols at all, they’d be telling him NOT to connect to Access’ terminal at all if pirated software was involved, but at this point, not upgrading would be a net-negative. He had his long rifle, but it was large enough that his inbuilt targeting array had some trouble with firing more than a few shots in quick succession. Though he was a custom job, his systems were never intended to accommodate a weapon that size and the hardware he had on-board reflected that. “Expose a diagnostic port for me, would you?” A small panel opened on the Synthetic’s neck, into which Access slot a few cables. “Don’t mind if I dig around do you?” “No.” Like any machine, self-aware or not, Synthetics required routine maintenance normally rendered unto the customer by a service center, but as Access ran a quick diagnostic systems check, it became increasingly obvious just how long he’d gone without a proper “check-up” as it were. Optics out of alignment, storage drives full of junk data, split coating around his limbs, worn out limb actuators and probably the most egregious of all, an outdated barely functional OS. “Couldn’t afford an upgrade, huh?” “The young miss has had better things to deal with, to be quite frank.” Snowy remarked. “I have dealt with what I can on my own, but as a Synth my options for social mobility are limited.” “Right, well, I can help you with your optics and outdated software, but you’ll have to handle the repair of your coating and mechanical maintenance yourself.” Access remarked, browsing around on his terminal. “In fact, you can align your optics yourself, as I have some software that should do that for you.” “I assume I’ll have to calibrate my optics with a little target practice, correct?” “The armory where we got your rifle has a firing range you can use, if you feel like some target practice will help you dial things in right. They don’t really care who uses the place as long as they buy something, so just buy a box of bullets and Ammo Can will be happy enough.” A distant wail could be heard on the horizon, following a sweeping high and low pattern just as the first few droplets of rain hit the window. The sound sent a shiver down Access’ spine, as such a sound only had a few meanings, but he hoped it was the more benign of the two. “Storm sirens?” Snowy remarked. “Lower Canterlot has storm defenses?” “if you can call them that. I hope that your casing is still waterproof, cause you’ll need it.” Access remarked, removing the cables from Snowy’s neck. “Upper Canterlot has weather manipulators, but they still need to deal with floodwater. No prizes for guessing where that’s gonna be going.” “Quite.” “By the way, where are Sheet and Star?” Access inquired. “Sheet ran out the door a while ago and I haven’t seen her since.” “The young miss is taking care of some business, as for your friend, who knows.” The front door suddenly slammed open, surprising both the Synthetic and Access. Sheet Rock tossed the chip Scarlet gave her to Access with a snicker. “Speak of the devil…” “Do the usual with this if you would, Access.” Sheet Rock remarked as she noticed that Snowy was in the room too. “It’s rare to see you two in the same room actually, what’s the occasion?” “Just some routine maintenance.” Snowy remarked. “You weren’t free, so I settled with the next best.” “Thanks, Snowy. I think.” Access mumbled. “Star’s not with you?” “Nope haven’t seen her. She’ll want to hurry up if she doesn’t want to get held up at a checkpoint, though I assumed she was with you.” Snowy attempted to raise Star via his integrated comm system, but had no luck. The connection dropped almost as soon as it started, so it was likely that she’d actively chosen not to take the call, or the storm had downed an antenna somewhere. It was so typical of her that she should vanish now, and the Synthetic allowed himself an uncharacteristically irritated growl. “I’m going to see where she’s gotten to, don’t wait up.” Snowy stated. “Access, could you patch up my mechanical systems yourself, just for now?” “Don’t got the stuff to do a patch job, but I can get it. I really would recommend an actual service center though…” “Noted.” “We’ve got a few things to discuss anyway, I’ll send you the footnotes.” Scarlet added. “Call us if you need anything.” Snowy nodded, power walking out the apartment and down the corridor. “Anyway… While you two were off getting drunk or whatever I took another crack at that portable terminal we found a while back. Turns out it’s set up as a sort of pseudo-anonymous comms network, which Riot might’ve used to communicate with his troops.” “Doesn’t do us much good now, to be honest.” “It was easy enough breaking into the device, but the encryption on the messages was another story.” Access explained. “I couldn’t crack the encryption that protects the terminal’s archived messages, but so long as the keys they’re using don’t change we should still be able to read any new messages just fine.” “Have they actually noticed that we have access?” Scarlet remarked. “I mean, you two weren’t exactly quiet, so they must’ve rotated out compromised keys by now.” Access retrieved the device from a drawer in his desk and showed the screen to the two mares with a smug look on his face. “Well yes, but actually no. Take a look, they’re actually still chatting away like nothing is wrong.” “If I were a betting mare, I’d say that it was on purpose.” “That’s what I thought too, Scarlet, it seems we agree for once.” “Don’t push your luck.” “I thought you said you couldn’t get anything out of it?” Sheet Rock pointed out. “You were pretty clear on that.” “I said it was UNLIKELY we’d get anything out of it. These things are pretty secure if you’re trying to breach it remotely, but since I have it in my hoof a lot of their security measures don’t matter.” “So did you get anything interesting out of it in the end?” “Well, as I said, they’re still using it to communicate, but it’s always in this really odd coded way.” Access remarked. “Here, let me show you.” As expect of a shadowy mercenary group, the terminal itself had little stored on its internal drive of consequence, some temporary files here, some chat logs there which were locked, but the interesting thing was what was contained in those chat logs. Quartz Red 31, for instance. An object, a color, and a number. Soon after a message structured like that was sent a response would be sent back soon after, but there was no discernible pattern, and unsurprisingly, the unencrypted portions of the logs themselves were an incomprehensible mess of seemingly unrelated terms, numbers, and colors. Each part of the message must correspond to something, perhaps a particular order, operative, severity ranking, or location maybe. From the messages that had been sent in the past few hours, Access was able to tell that the first word was more than likely either the sender or the intended recipient, the color could possibly be how urgent the order was, and lastly, the order itself represented as a set of numerals. This was of course, complete speculation, but it seemed likely given how often colors were used to represent certain things, such to bring attention to something, or as a warning. “And yes, I am logging every message that comes through, though I have my doubts as to how useful it’ll be, especially if I’m wrong as what I think each part means.” “While I’d like nothing more than to follow the next trail of breadcrumbs, we have other things to contend with.” “You said odd things were happening, corporate police on the move, shows of power and such?” Scarlet remarked. “Consider the possibility that terminal might not be Riot’s, it might belong to someone else and he just happened to come upon it like we did. If I were him and I needed to send coded messages, I wouldn’t lock up a device I needed immediate access to.” “That’s… a good point exactly. I thought it might’ve belonged to one of his cronies, but the more I think about it, the less it makes sense for them to have it.” Access replied. “There were ponies jacked into their chairs nearby where we found it, noticed a lot of cabling and the husks of servers dotted about too. Clearly someone wanted the stuff gone, but got a little sloppy toward the end of their rampage. Sending coded messages has to be one of the most analogue and old-fashioned ways of communicating, especially when you have the money to buy your Netrunners top-of-the-line chairs.” “I love a good mystery you know, really gets the juices flowing.” Scarlet remarked sarcastically. “Frankly I think your little super-soldier friend had a hoof in it.” “You might be right, given what I’ve heard on the grapevine recently.” Access replied. “To be honest, we should just shelve this until morning, and then pick this up again when we know more. Agreed?” Sheet Rock shot Scarlet an apologetic glance before she walked off toward her own room, but not before offering Scarlet the sofa to sleep on. There was a camp cot stashed away somewhere as well, but that was like sleeping on the fake grass you’d find in every corporate plaza ever which was highly unappealing. Sheet Rock promised to pay Scarlet back for the chip she’d given then, even if she didn’t want to accept payment. Genetech had their secrets like any corporation, but they were especially shadowy and secretive when it came to protecting their property to a level that would make even the big four blush.