Elite (Citizen Saga, Book 1) (7 page)

"Any visitors?" I asked as I unwrapped my ankle and gingerly tested my weight.

"No visitors. No calls," Shiloh replied succinctly.

I re-wrapped my leg and started toward my bedroom, desperately wanting out of the k
'ri k'ri
and into my normal clothes. It was all well and good to play dress-up, but I was an
Anglisc
descendant, not
D'awan
. I wanted back in my own cultural uniform for tonight's escapades.

"Run system check," I instructed as I pulled black fitted trousers and a black shirt out of my closet, followed by a black jacket with multiple pockets and hidden hiding places to stash everything I'd need.

"Checking," Shiloh confirmed.

I took a quick shower as she determined if we'd been hacked or pinged by the Overseers. Carried out my usual bathroom routine and then dressed. By the time I was grabbing a bite to eat from the kitchen, Shiloh had completed her checks. A Shiloh unit is not a simple programme, but a conglomerate of several incredibly technical ones. Checks usually take from five minutes to half an hour depending on how many add-ons your Shiloh has.

Mine is special. My father made her that way.

"Check complete," Shiloh announced as I finished my reheated noodles. I washed it away with water and walked over to Shiloh's vid-screen in the kitchen, just about spitting the mouthful back out again.

There'd been pings all right. And an attempted hack. One was the official Overseers' ping at the beginning of a cycle, to determine your unit was online and functioning correctly. That is, uploading data to the Wánměi system, spying like the good little robot Shiloh normally is. I'd expected that one, and I was relieved there hadn't been another ping from the Overseers since then, because it meant Selena Carstairs was clean, despite my multiple errors last night.

I breathed a sigh of relief even as I looked at the further four pings from a Wánměi Internet Protocol Address and their hack attempt in the middle of it. If it was Overseer or Cardinal originated then I would have expected drones on my doorstep when I got home. I'd been here for hours, even managing to catch up on sleep. So my guess, it was Citizen based. But who?

I wondered if Harjeet had checked up on me, but some of the pings had occurred before I even went to
Little D'awa
. So that didn't fit. Then who?

I pulled the business card Harjeet had given me out of one of my jacket pockets and ran my finger over the name and phone number. I hadn't written the address down, I didn't need to. It was easy enough to remember, even if
Hillsborough
wasn't a suburb I traversed often. But for anyone to attempt to hack a Shiloh they'd have to be experienced tech whizzes. Like the name on this card. And there weren't that many tech whizzes in Wánměi, this guy was in a select group, narrowing the field.

There was no way to be certain, but my gut was telling me this was all connected. The first ping happened not long after Wántel. I could only assume it had something to do with the black clad men who'd been after the file as well. They'd iRec'd me. Not been able to find me as Lena Carr, but maybe used an offline iRec version that ID'd me as Selena Carstairs. Then tried to hack my home.

I let an aggravated breath of air out and shook my head. Feeling bizarrely honoured. This was almost as engaging as breaking into a high security building.

With a wicked curve to my lips I said, "Shiloh, ping them back."

"Fuck. She's pinged us," Si said, breaking into the quiet of the room. "How the hell did she do that?"

"How the hell do
you
do that?" Kevin said from his usual spot at the back of the room.

I pushed Carla off my lap, ignoring her pout and growled protest, and walked over to look at Si's screen.

"What will it tell her?" I asked, already knowing the answer but feeling the need to check.

"Nothing," Si confirmed. "We're as tight as a drum."

"Then why's the screen scrolling like that?" I pressed.

"The ping's invasive. It's not enough to just see where we are, she's pinging every single programme we have to get a feel for us."

"That's not the definition of nothing," I pointed out.

"Yeah well," Si said, running a hand through his long hair and then frantically beginning to type commands on the screen. "She's not exactly the definition of an Elite."

"You should have anticipated this," I said softly.

"How?" Carla asked. "She's a fucking Elite."

I glanced over my shoulder at her thinking I really shouldn't have entertained Carla at all tonight, and said, "She broke into Wántel and stole an encrypted file out of Chen's secured folder and set off a virus to cover her tracks. She escaped out of a reinforced glass window from the top floor and avoided being cornered by Alan. So far, she's dodged every Cardinal drone and not been picked up on the system. Her Shiloh unit goes on and offline at random, and still manages to stay under the radar. What part of any of that makes you think she's just a fucking Elite?"

"
You
said she was just a fucking Elite," Carla argued.

"That was before I shared a train carriage with her."

"We all know about your little cosy tête-à-tête," Carla ground out.

"That cosy tête-à-tête allowed me to learn a hell of a lot," I argued.

"Great! So she's not dosed. Big deal. Neither are we," Carla pointed out.

"The ping's over," Si said, interrupting Carla's and my staring match. I
really
shouldn't have encouraged her tonight.

"And?" I said gratefully swinging back to look at Si's screen.

"And she knows we have good security."

"That's not much," I said with relief.

"She also will know we're not Wánměi approved," he added.

I let a breath out. Opened my mouth to say something, then shut it again.

"This is where you say, it's OK," Si offered, spinning in his chair to look up at me. "You know. Tell us she's not Wánměi approved either; she's hardly going to draw attention to herself by outing us."

I blinked down at him.

"Do you honestly think I've lost my mind that much?"

Si snorted. "It was a topic of discussion when you refused to tell us where you were going earlier today."

"Yes, but I'm sure you found me in the system sooner or later."

Si slipped me a knowing look but didn't say anything aloud. If he'd located me outside Selena Carstairs'
Parnell
home, then he wasn't letting on to the others. Si had always had my back. I just wasn't sure how much longer he'd put up with me behaving erratically like this.

There was something about this woman. At first I thought it was purely my need for revenge. But then I spent time with her. Saw the calculated look in her beautiful pale blue eyes. Watched her bravely try to inhale Tyger Menthol smoke without showing that it affected her. Saw someone like us.

I hadn't wanted her to be like us. Not Calvin Carstairs' daughter. Not the only child of the man who killed my father. But there'd been something there. When she watched from the shadows as a man was arrested for failing his test. As she battled that drone with her shoulders back and her chin up, and then just as brilliantly changed tack when I walked into the scene. How she'd made an assessment and casually chose the most likely path to succeed. She thinks on her feet. She's quick and intelligent. She's a survivor and most definitely not complacent or ration dosed. Clearly capable of taking great risks. An asset we could use.

And she was vulnerable. I saw how she looked when she appeared in the shade outside her home dressed in an aqua
k
'ri k'ri
. I had no idea where she'd been to have cause to wear traditional dress such as that. Elites attend copious parties for any reason they can think of. Maybe she'd been celebrating
Little D'awa
Day or something. But for wherever reason, she was distraught.

Still alert and careful, scanning the streets, almost spotting me. But the haunted cast in those gorgeous eyes, the way she looked lost and so alone, even as she shimmered in the midday light. I'd had every intention of confronting her. Finding a reason to question her inside her apartment. It would have been easy. We'd met. I officially knew where she lived, who she was. She wouldn't have been overly surprised to see me at her door.

Hell, I even considered just pretending I fancied her. Or at least the Cardinal I was pretending to be did. It would have been quite an acceptable arrangement, even if Elites just don't appear unannounced on each other's doorstep.

But one look at how fragile she appeared and I'd backed away. I can't explain it. Simply faded into the shadows and watched for a while to determine she hadn't been followed. And when I was satisfied, returned to the hub.

Then berated myself so soundly I accepted Carla's offer as soon as I walked in the door, in the hopes it would scrub my mind clear and reboot my system.

It hadn't. The instant Si had said Selena was pinging us I'd felt my body stir. It'd felt a million times better than Carla's efforts.

And now what?

"Now what?" Kevin unconsciously echoed from the back of the room.

"Now, we wait to see if she hacks us," Si supplied.

"You think she will?" Carla asked from several paces across the room, clearly getting the signal to keep well away from me.

I should have felt guilty. It was tantamount to leading the woman on. But my attention was completely on the screen and the message the ping had delivered.

"Hard to know," Si was saying. "It's one thing to ping an IP address and leave a calling card. It's a whole other level to hack their Shiloh."

"She won't do it," Carla declared scathingly, as if she knew this Elite completely and didn't have a doubt she was beneath such skill.

I shook my head, my lips spreading in a feral grin.

Then read the words on the screen aloud, "Have you been a model Citizen today?"

And now I knew the Elite had a sense of humour.

Si glanced up at me and raised an eyebrow. Probably at the look he could see on my face.

"Wanna reply, boss?"

Yeah. Yeah, I did.

"Ping her back," I said nodding to the screen. "And add a message."

Si turned to his touch keyboard and entered the command for a ping, opening up a message box when it was ready. His fingers hovered expectantly over the keys, silence hung in the air like thick fog. Everyone held their breaths.

Then I leaned over Si's shoulder, pushed his hands out of the way, and typed in the message, hitting send before he could stop me.

Let's see how she handles that.

I smoked my Tyger Menthols, did you?

I jumped back from the screen with a gasp. It was him. The Cardinal from the train.

What the hell did that mean?

"Check blocks," I ordered Shiloh numbly, my eyes darting all over the screen as though I'd see an answer there.

Nothing, just the flashing reply that accompanied his ping.

I looked down at the name on Harjeet's card wondering if it was his. Were they connected? The tech whiz Harjeet had connected me with and the Cardinal on that train?

Only one way to find out.

"All blocks solid," Shiloh announced.

I bit my lip and contemplated the insanity of what I was about to attempt. There was no way to use the telephone system in Wánměi and not be traced or possibly overheard. My father had left me a Shiloh unit that could block and ghost and do all manner of incredible things, but it could not provide a secured telephone line. It was a risk. An enormous one. But then all I needed to do was hear his voice to know.

"Open a line," I whispered, my heartbeat thundering in my ears.

A dial tone sounded out over the speakers.

"What number please?" Shiloh asked.

I cleared my throat. If I was going to do this, I was going to do it with a strong voice.

The phone number tumbled off numb lips and I waited for Shiloh to connect us. I'd started shaking, just slightly. A trembling in my limbs, a tingling in my fingertips. I realised I was breathing too quickly, and sucked in a deep breath holding it as I heard the number tones as Shiloh dialled.

This was going to be extremely dangerous, and yet I thrilled at the challenge it brought.

The tone changed to a ringing one, it continued to pulse for several beats, and then finally someone answered.

"Hello?" a male said, giving me absolutely nothing to go on.

For a second I wasn't sure what to do. It didn't sound like the Cardinal, but it was hard to tell over a phone line. Was it or wasn't it?

I'd have to say something.

"Is this Simon Richards?" I asked.

"Who is this?" came his immediate reply.

No. It wasn't his voice. I was sure of it. Even having only spent an hour at the most in his company, I'd remember that voice.

So, what now?

I ignored the man's question, and tried, "A friend of mine gave me your details. Perhaps you know him. Harjeet?"

Silence.

Then, "I don't know him. But then Wánměi is big."

I wondered if there was a secret password. A question you asked and had to answer in a certain way. This all seemed so clandestine, and it wasn't as though I could blurt out my request to have an identity scrubbed in a phone conversation that may or may not be overheard, to a man who may or may not be connected to the Cardinals.

I really had no idea how to play this.

I reached up to my vid-screen and placed the call on mute, and said, "Ping them," to Shiloh, deleting the mute function afterwards.

"Perhaps we could meet," I suggested over the phone line, while I watched Shiloh send out a ping.

"Why?"

"I believe you may be able to help me."

I heard the soft tone of a ping in the background down the line.

I smiled.

Gotcha.

"Well, now," he said in a drawl. "What exactly is it I can do for an Elite?"

He knew it was me pinging his IP address. All our cards were on the table.

But if he was the one to hack me, and the message on that last ping was from the Cardinal, how the hell did this all fit? A Cardinal in cahoots with an inappropriate tech whiz Citizen.

This was still an enormous risk.

"I wouldn't know until I met you," I hedged.

"I'm not in the habit of meeting people I don't know," the man countered. "Perhaps if you explained your situation further."

Time to cut and run.

"I'm afraid Harjeet has made a mistake. I'm sorry to have disturbed you, Citizen. Wánměi above all others," I offered politely.

A small pause, then he dutifully replied, "Wánměi leads the way."

I disconnected the call and stood very still. Then shot into action. Checking my jacket for all necessities, grabbing the business card and setting it alight in the sink, and finally heading to the door.

"Delayed reactivation, Selena Carstairs, 241368," I said just before I exited my home, my eyes scanning the hallway on either side when I'd made it through the entrance.

It had started raining again by the time I arrived outside, thunder echoing in the night sky. Thursday night curfew was in effect, so I had to either walk or drive myself, and as
Hillsborough
was on the other side of the island, I had no choice but to take a car. I walked the block over to where I occasionally "borrowed" vehicles, slipped into the parking garage and approached with care. This was an apartment complex inhabited by Cardinals of various levels, all of which had permission to come and go in the middle of curfew nights.

My eyes scanned the garage, keeping my body hidden from the security-cams, ears straining for any sounds out of place. The thunder boomed further away now, but lightning flashed in the night sky intermittently, illuminating the dimly lit space. I pulled my offline PDA from my pocket and scrolled through the names of those Cardinals who lived here, checking their vehicle number against those present, and cross checking against the Cardinal roster I had stored on the device.

I found three vehicles suitable. I moved forward in a crouch down one row, rechecked the camera angles, and then started to work on the door of the car closest to the exit. It was a nice four wheel drive with tinted windows and an excellent sound system. Only one of which would help me out tonight.

The door unlocked with a loud beep, any second louder and more persistent ones would follow. I slipped into the driver's seat, lying myself down so as not to be pictured through the windshield and got to work on cracking the security code. Had I returned to my
Wáikěiton
home after Wántel I wouldn't have had the equipment to get this done. But I'd come straight to
Parnell Rise
dressed in my skin tight flight-suit, weighed down with the tech gear I'd used to break into Chen's building and steal that file.

As the decoder found the right combination to start the vehicle without setting off an alarm, I thanked my lucky stars that night
had
turned to crap and led me here. All I had of worth was on me, except the flight-suit. That I'd hidden in the apartment with Shiloh on guard.

The car started with a whine and the distinctive voice of its own Shiloh unit sounded out.

"Do you require directions, Cardinal?" she asked, assuming I was the owner and not someone stealing the vehicle from right under her nose.

"No," I replied, putting the car in gear and moving out into the night.

At each intersection my heart rate sky-rocketed. Whenever a drone driven vehicle rolled past I held my breath. I tracked the progress of street-cam angles with obsession. I checked my rear view mirror at least a hundred times. Even with the air-con up high I was sweating.

It wasn't as if I hadn't done this before, but somehow it all seemed so much more dangerous all of a sudden.

Zhang Yong's face swam before my eyes, followed swiftly by his five year old son and then his daughters.

I'd always known the consequences of being caught were harsh. I'd just never been close enough to anything to feel the burn.

I felt it now as I made my way swiftly, on near empty streets, to
Hillsborough
. Even my dubious connection to General Chew-wen would count for nothing if this blew up in my face. And knowing that, I should have just turned around and returned to Parnell Rise.

But I didn't.

Lena Carr was too important. And that damn flash-drive burning a hole in my chest meant something. And the Yehs' deaths plagued me the entire way.

They died for a reason, I just didn't know yet what that reason was. For now, I needed to contain this problem with the Cardinal from the train. I needed to find a way to scrub Lena Carr's identity so I could use it again. And then I needed to find out what those codes actually meant.

First things first, I'd arrived in
Hillsborough
.

Row upon row of tall apartment buildings dominated the night sky. Block after block of identical structures reaching up like thick fingers into the clouds. Enormous numbers methodically counted down each address, painted in bright red digits on the side of the building facing
Hillsborough
Road. If I turned in a circle, where I stood, I'd see the same thing for the entirety of the rotation. Wánměi suburbia. Organised. Identified. Homogeneous.

Behind them, in the distance, lights of another city could be seen. So close. So tempting. But it might as well have not have existed at all. Before General Chew-wen we'd been able to leave Wánměi and visit other locations. People should still remember that time, remember those places. But it wasn't spoken of. Those places were corrupt. They did not follow doctrine. They were not model Citizens.

I parked the car in a row of other cars, one of many and easily overlooked. It would be there when I was ready to return to
Parnell
. Or, if things went better than expected,
Wáikěiton
; Lena Carr's identity scrubbed and usable again.

I wasn't holding out any hope. And the further I slipped into
Hillsborough
itself, the more I couldn't fathom why a Cardinal would work closely with a tech whiz Citizen from here. A small part of me wondered if it was a cover. The Cardinals using this location to hide their involvement. If they were, it was something new for them. Something sinisterly covert.

And it wasn't as though they didn't harbour enough of a dark reputation as it is.

I checked my bearings, found the building the telephone number was attached to and stood in the shadows, out of the pouring rain, and watched. Lights were on in apartments. Vid-screens flickering in dim interiors. Music could be heard through open windows. Not everyone used their air-con units, some liked to feel the heat.

Getting in wouldn't be the problem. Avoiding the security cameras should be easy enough. Finding the exact apartment simple. But still I hesitated before taking a further step. I lifted my gaze to the roofline, thirty floors above. There was nothing to indicate this apartment complex was different from all the others, but still I held back. Unsure why, just waiting for inspiration to hit.

There was a window cleaning gantry hanging over the side, not exactly above where I estimated the apartment was located, but close enough. I'd planned to check the floor out, watch the apartment door from there. But seeing inside was always the ultimate goal.

I moved, silent and sleek through the rain and shadows, swift and unseen by street-cams or residents glancing out of their windows. Within seconds I'd made the service entrance and had my decoder out and attached to the door. I blocked the glow of the digital display as it attempted to crack the code. For a residential apartment building it had good security, because it took the device twice as long as it should have. My first indication I was in the right place.

Once through I flashed my laser at camera lenses, quickly making short work of the ground floor. The stairwell required another decoding, making my shoulders tense and my ears ring trying to hear any approaching noise. I half expected to see an eScanner, what with the level of security this place had, and a part of me was disappointed not to face that challenge tonight.

Still, gaining access was always a thrill, regardless of the level of obstacles.

I sucked in a deep breath as the door disengaged and then I was off up the stairs, counting silently in my head, my ankle only just offering a small twitch every now and then. By the tenth floor that twitch had become a dull ache. By the fifteenth it had started to send shooting pains up my shins. By the twentieth I was favouring that leg. The last five floors I had to walk.

Anger was never a good accompaniment when you planned to break and enter.

I didn't waste time with getting the decoder attached to the roof access, even as I sucked in desperate breaths of air trying to re-oxygenate. Eighteen seconds later I was out on the roof in the wind and rain.

I crouched down and checked for security-cams, coming up blank. Not many people would have need to access the roof of a residential building, most security systems overlooked this as a possible crack in their façade. Lock codes more than enough to ensure the average Citizen kept out of the way of the window cleaning and air-con maintenance crews.

Once satisfied no alarms had been set off and no one was waiting to attack, I strode across the surface towards the gantry and leaned over the side of the building to see how far down it actually was.

I'd have to jump, or start the unit up. And I had no intention of drawing attention to myself with activating machinery in the middle of the night. Someone would pick that up, I was sure. Checking my pockets to be certain everything was contained, I lowered myself over the side of the rooftop, hanging on by my fingertips on the ledge of the thirty storey building, then let myself drop.