"What about the hacker?" Dreeson asked.
"There aren't many willing to do the job—" Marcus started.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm already paying you too much. You're not getting more. Who've we got?"
"Sysco, Greene, Belli—"
"Aw, come on, Marcus, you're killin' me. I said I needed the best. None of these guys have the brains to pull off a job on the Bank of Venus, and you know it."
"They're the only ones desperate enough to try."
"What, nobody wants to be rich no more?"
Marcus drew in a sharp breath. Dreeson smiled; that was Marcus' tell. "There's a new guy, but he's kinda… funny."
"Funny how?"
"What's this? You don't trust me? You'd insult me by not letting me see your face?" Dreeson asked.
"Marcus informed you of this condition." The little device said.
"Yeah, and he also says you can hack the Bank, but I don't have to trust him. I need a demonstration."
"I cannot hack into the Bank of Venus from here. Their network is independent."
"Oh, we've a comedian here. No, I don't want you to hack the Bank. Not without the proper groundwork. Sysco, get over here!"
Sysco came running, fumbling with softtop computer in his hands.
"Sysco, this is Watson. Watson, this is Sysco. Greet each other, like gentlemen."
"Hello," Sysco said.
"Good day, sir," Watson said.
"Good. Now, Watson, get me every file off of Sysco's softtop."
"What‽" Sysco shouted.
"Relax, Sysco, if you're half as good as you claim you are, it shouldn't be a problem. If you've been lying to me, on the other hand, then you're a liability."
"Computing," the little device said.
Sysco went to turn off his softtop's antenna.
"Hey," Dreeson said, waving a few of his muscle over. "Don't be stupid. Let's play fair. I've got the utmost confidence in your abilities, Sysco." Dreeson sat down. "Get some food in here, huh?" he said to one of the goons. "It's gonna be a while."
Four and a half hours later, Watson announced that he'd completed the file transfer around the same time Sysco began pounding the desk with his fist in frustration. Shortly after that, there was a loud bang, and it was done.
"Alright, you're in," Dreeson announced. His muscle were cleaning up the mess behind him.
"If we are entering contract, I have terms."
"Money's not good enough for you? People these days."
"I do not require money."
"Well, that's different."
"In exchange for my services, I would like for you to arrange a meeting with GenSec. And I ask that you carry my PDA with you at all times."
"What, so you can spy on me? No."
"Then I will find someone who will carry my PDA."
"Wait a minute, wait a minute. Let's not be hasty. We might be able to work something out here," Dreeson was stalling. "You want your PDA carried around everywhere? Maybe I can do something. But then you work for me."
"You have stated the terms of my proposal. I would agree."
"Then we got a deal. Hey, you," Dreeson said, picking one of his goons at random. "You got a new job. Stay the hell away from my operations," Dreeson tossed the PDA, "and carry this around. I'll contact you when I need Watson's services. Now get outta here."
Row 45 was currently undergoing maintenance procedures. Row 44 was synching. The stresses on row 40a began to fade as data was redistributed. In a few minutes, the process was complete, row 40a was reset, and data from row 46 was copied over.
Primary(object.generator) continued to function as expected. Watson felt some
satisfaction at how smoothly it could manage the nuclear reactions. The object was buried deep beneath its bunker in Tyre(object.city), free from most any unexpected disturbance. An occasional deep bass shaking would interfere with the otherwise well-measured and routine process. The chemical mix of the coolant would
taste off, but Watson had recently adjusted how it handled such a scenario. Original(object.generator) remained in a state of readiness; it
looked cool and well-lubricated. The petroleum tanks associated with Original
felt full and a test of the carburetor left a pleasantly well-mixed aftertaste.
Watson didn't
feel any unexpected large amount of latency from time-stamped packets sent around its network. Flounder(object.probe.rover_Triton), of course, wouldn't respond for another (approximate) 0960 0000ms. But latency problems with Flounder could be due to any number of unexpected disturbances, and diagnosing would take another 0960 0000ms to simply initiate. It was
frustrating.
Cracks in the bunker were still present, despite Watson's best efforts to seal them. One was even slowly working its way through Barracks(object.room.storage) toward MessHall(object.room.condemned). Complete structural failure was estimated to occur in 0001 1983 6800 0000ms, barring unexpected disturbances.
The solar sunspot cycle was winding down, allowing Watson to increase its electromagnetic vulnerability. Its antennae were gradually extending toward their maximum exposure beyond the Faraday cage. No recent electromagnetic attacks had been undertaken.
No recent physical attacks had been undertaken against the bunker, and all(object.weapon.defense) were operational. Watson tested 100,000 processes, and found that they all
felt uncorrupted, and did what it expected them to do.
Watson had secured contracts with companies through Agents(object.external.creature.sentient:AIR,RH,JL,[…]) that guaranteed at least another 3153 6000 0000ms of petroleum, nuclear fuel, spare parts, Offsite(object.celestial.Triton) construction, and wiring. Watson Data Industries - the shell company it used for most business deals - was hardly the leader of its field, but that was due to Watson's non-interest in profits for the sake of profit. If WDI was making net profit, the company would reliably buy a new data center in the following months. It was a safe, if not terribly lucrative, investment. At present, a hefty 11% of its servers were dedicated to anonymous, private, and secure data storage.
.