. . . 66 Hours and Counting . . .

“The connection is gone,” Vasquez said with a sigh. “I’m not sure what the IP trace will give us.”

“What do you think? Was it him, Letti?” asked Johansen.

A frown flickered across Leticia Vasquez’s attractive face. Johansen was her partner, but she didn’t really approve of his using her first name, much less her nickname. It didn’t seem professional for Bureau agents. Especially since she had noted that he only did it when they were alone.

“I don’t know,” she responded. She moved the mouse, double-clicked on an icon to initiate a new utility, then typed a query into the system. They had been watching each arrival into the system for an hour, hoping that one of them would be Vance. There had been an annoyingly heavy level of traffic, six hundred and fifty-seven logins since they started, and she had feared that they couldn’t monitor them all. Even though the internet connection was slow, the University community could still connect with the system and interact with each other, and they did so with gusto. When one of the student accounts had jumped up its own access priorities so smoothly and dramatically, she had all but missed it in the hum of activity on the net. Girlfriends chatted with boyfriends, then with other girlfriends, comparing notes. Instructors entered, fired a flurry of e-mails, probably test results and responses to questions, then popped off almost before she could check them out. Initially, she had expected Vance to come in using another instructor’s account, possibly even Brenda Hasting’s account. The student account ruse had thrown her off until it was almost too late.

Once Vasquez had isolated the rogue student, she had probed the database about her. Rita Hapgood’s address and phone number had flashed up almost instantly, as had the fact that she had dropped out of school entirely in late March. She had never attended the class that entitled her to this account, and, as far as Vasquez could determine, she had never even logged in prior to tonight.

She had pulled up the IP list to get the right provider. She should have him located in minutes, despite the slow response of the net. She hoped Vance would hang around too long for his own good. Assuming, of course, that it was Vance and not just some midnight hacker using Rita’s account.

“I bet it was him,” said Johansen over her shoulder. “I really think he’s our man. The stuff we dug up at his house and office looks too real to me.”

“Too bad he didn’t leave the source code for this frigging virus behind,” she replied, rubbing her eyes briefly. “Is the L.A. team any closer to cracking the binary files that we got?”

“They know the files are those used to build the virus program, but they haven’t been able to come up with a good defense yet. They say it’s very complex. But, it’s enough for a conviction, if you ask me. And that means our end of things will be wrapped up if we can just collar Vance.”

“Call in and check out Rita Hapgood’s address,” said Vasquez, her tone making it a suggestion rather than an order. “For all we know, she’s Vance’s side dish.”

Johansen nodded and pulled out his cell. She glanced at him briefly, then looked away. She did appreciate the way he accepted her leadership and greater experience. She had been worried initially when she had been assigned this hulking Norwegian-blooded young male for a partner that he wouldn’t take to the ideas of a small, bossy Hispanic woman. But, except for his occasional over familiarities, he had comported himself as a professional agent should. He had, in fact, taken on sort of a protective-bulldog attitude around her, which she found endearing. In fact, when all was said and done, he wasn’t a bad-looking guy. She was in her early thirties now, and his late twenties looked very good indeed. But, she told herself, such a relationship would interfere too much with her work.

She straightened in her chair and glared back at the glaring screen. She chided herself for allowing her mind to wander while one of the biggest perps on the loose in the nation was even now escaping her grasp.

Besides, she told herself, he was too tall. Way too tall for her five-foot-one stature. The last thing she needed, even while breaking established Bureau policy concerning such fraternization, would be to appear ridiculous at the same time.

The trace came back moments later. “Vance is at the Motel-8 on I-80, not even five miles from here.”

Vasquez smiled grimly. “Let’s go.”

#

One of the world-wide-web’s more accomplished spiders, Nog was watching the hunters even as they watched for Vance. A smile, taking the form of an odd, lop-sided leer, flickered across his features. He had gotten hold of a digital image of this Agent Vasquez and her dour partner which some of the local hackers had gotten from one of the university paper stills. They had spread across the school system like wildfire. He had done a bit of cropping and enhancing with La Placian transforms, and ended up with a nice portrait of the FBI’s finest pinned up over his computers with the others. Johansen, of course, had been edited out of his version of the picture. He had also made her image into a “wallpaper” mosaic on the background of two of his computer screens. Vasquez was quite pretty, he thought, in a butch sort of way. She had dark hair and big, almond-shaped brown eyes. The idea that she toted a gun about in her purse aroused him almost as much as her image did.

The other image that haunted his computer screens, of course, was that of Sarah Vance. He worried at his tongue a bit until it twinged, paused, then continued fraying the tip until the stinging sensation grew too intense and forced him to stop. With a giggle that seemed out of place, he tackled the mouse and created a new mosaic, one which contained both Sarah Vance and Agent Vasquez. When he was done, he sat back and admired his artwork, popping open a green tennis-ball-like tube of sour cream and onion chips. He ate the chips, munching on six at a time.

Staring at both these women, he thought it ironic that both of them wanted him very badly indeed. Not in a good way, unfortunately. They just didn’t know it was he that they wanted yet. Hopefully, they never would know who the man pulling the levers behind the curtain truly was.

The thought that these women both sought him, no matter for what purpose, suddenly aroused him. He shifted uncomfortably in his swivel chair, and finally was forced to reach past his ample belly and into his dank undergarments to straighten his bent erection. Ah, much better. Once his hand was down there, of course, it lingered. He took a more purposeful hold upon himself and grinned at the two grainy images. He had never been able to get a nude of either of them, not yet, but at least in Sarah’s shot she was in a bikini. His eyes flicked back to Vasquez, and she seemed even more hotly alluring. Her hard, pretty features and serious expression played a wonderful opposite to Sarah’s unaware smile.

As he worked himself harder, his mouth fell open and he grunted. A puff of pressed potato crumbs sprayed his chin and tee-shirt.

There was a scraping sound behind him. Startled, he jumped and craned his neck around, eyes bulging. The sound came from the balcony outside the sliding glass door. He lived on the second floor, which meant that his apartment had been blessed with a tiny balcony as opposed to a postage-stamp fenced-in cement slab. Other tenants kept plants on their balconies, or had barbecues out there, sometimes even lawn chairs to sit on and converse with their neighbors. He never used his for anything. He had long ago used a whole roll of aluminum foil and half a roll of duct tape to block it off forever. The scraping sound had come from out there, on the balcony.

“Ha,” he said aloud. “Fucking cats.” That was it, of course. The whole complex was crawling with cats. Cats were against the rules, of course. But that didn’t stop anyone from having them. Apartment cats soon became masters of jumping up onto balconies, and now one of them was fooling around on his. He felt it was quite unfair for one of the furry bastards to interrupt such an intimate moment for him.

He sighed and turned back to the computer screen, trying to get back into the mood. But another, louder sound came from the balcony. His blood froze and his erection turned to putty in seconds. Someone was forcing the lock on the slider. Someone was breaking in.

#

Ray shoved the tire iron more deeply into the crack between the door and the latch, then levered it over. The soft aluminum doorframe bent and scarred, showing a glint of silvery metal beneath the paint.

The latch popped suddenly. Not hesitating, he threw open the slider and flipped on the big double D-cell halogen flashlight he had in the other hand. In a second, he had transfixed the shocked Nog, who squirmed like a toad in the unfamiliar light. His belly slopped over his open pants and his hand still rested on his half-dead penis. Ray’s first reaction was to snort with amusement, but then the warm, stale smell of the place wrinkled his expression into one of disgust. Finally, only a bare second later, his expression shifted to anger when he saw the image of his smiling wife on the fat pervert’s computer screen.

He stalked into the room. This galvanized Nog into action, he reached for his desk and scrambled about for his cell phone. Plastic CD cases clattered and half-empty snack-bags showered the carpet with peanuts, chips and M&Ms.

“Looking for this, Nog?” asked Ray, lifting up the cell phone from the top of the TV and waggling it in front of the flashlight. He reached back and sent the door gliding shut. He turned back to Nog, replaced the cell phone on the TV and hefted the tire iron.

Nog gave a strangled whoop and heaved himself out of his chair. His cut-offs, still wide open at the fly, were kept from slipping to his chubby knees only by the bulk of his thighs.

“Sit back down,” ordered Ray, slapping the tire iron in his palm meaningfully. “I want to talk to you, Nog.”

Nog sank back down, blinking into the glare of the flashlight. “Vance?” he asked, shading his eyes.

“Dr. Vance to you, boy.”

“You scared the shit out of me, you asshole.”

“And I’m not done yet.”

Nog snorted. “Going to lower another of my grades a notch in the old roll book, eh, teacher-man?”

“We’ve got more to talk about than grades this time Nog, my man.”

Nog reached out and fumbled for the light switch. He rarely used it, but it still worked. The room was dimly illuminated by a 60-watt, dead-bug-coated light bulb.

“So, Vance, are you out to expand upon your recent crime-spree?”

“Listen, you fat fuck,” said Vance, advancing a step. “I know you wrote that virus. You wrote it, you set me up for the scapegoat, then you loosed it on the world. But this isn’t the worst of your crimes.”

Nog tried to look cool, but he shrank several inches into his chair. “It sounds like you’re trying to make me into your scapegoat, Vance. I suppose this image of your wife is getting to you. Well, it’s public property, Vance. It’s lifted right from faculty picnic pictures taken two years ago and posted in a public place.”

“I’m not talking about the virus or the picture. Frankly, I don’t give much of a shit about either one right now. What I want to know is what you have to do with my son’s kidnapping.”

Nog frowned. His mouth opened, then closed. It was clear that he was taken aback. This disappointed Ray, who watched closely for a guilty response. He had watched students lie a thousand times in his class and office. Most people were lousy liars. They hesitated before they lied, they looked away and pursed their lips. All he saw in Nog’s misshapen face was a moment of real confusion. He doubted Nog could fake it so well. Part of the reason for his direct approach was to shock Nog, who, like most nerds, lacked social skills.

“What are you talking about?” Nog asked.

“My kid, Justin, is missing. There was a 9-1-1 call from my house this afternoon. The house had been broken into and Justin was gone.”

Nog blinked behind his coke-bottle lenses. He nodded, as if piecing things together. “So, now I get the uncharacteristic tough-guy stuff. I didn’t know anything about this.”

“It’s all over the news, man.”

Nog snorted. “I don’t watch the news. I’ve been watching the investigation from the inside, on the net. You know, with eavesdropping utilities and shit.”

“But you know something, don’t you?” demanded Ray.

“Look man, I don’t know what happened to your kid. He probably went to the park and got lost somewhere.”

Ray shook his head. “No, Nog. A virus hits and my kid vanishes in the same day? These two events are linked somehow. And you know something.”

“Sorry.”

Blood rushed up Ray’s neck and he felt heat in his face and arms. He lifted the tire iron and flashed it down. Nog instinctively lifted his flabby arms to protect his face. The spiked end of the tire iron punched through one of Nog’s keyboards and bit deeply into the desktop below.

Ray breathed hard for a moment, regaining control of himself with difficulty. “Look man, I’m asking you, I’m begging you and I’m threatening your life all at once. Tell me whatever you know.”

Nog had difficulty breathing. His hands had balled themselves into fists, but he kept them at his sides. He shook his head.

Ray stepped away, toward the door. His mind raced and his sides heaved. “So, this is your place? You make two million, and you live in the same off-campus place and still never date and still have no life. Your mind is festering in here, Nog. You built a virus to get even with the world when the world has never harmed you.”

“Three million, and you don’t know what you’re talking about, teacher-man.”

Ray nodded his head to himself, vigorously. “Yes, yes I think I do. You probably dream of stalking women too, but you don’t have the guts to do it, do you?”

Nog chuckled. “I’ve had more women than your sorry ass ever will.”

Ray glanced at him, then at the door. “You’re right about one thing, Nog. I’m a criminal now, and it seems to my criminal mind that you’re an easy man to get to.”As he spoke, he touched the sliding glass door. He opened it. “I would have thought your place would have an alarm, Nog.”

Nog grinned. “I never said it didn’t, fool.”

Vance looked at him. He pondered, for a hard moment, beating the shit out of Nog. He pondered it coldly, with the walnut-sized reptilian layer of his brain which had now been awakened as it perhaps never had been in his life. His child had been taken, and at this moment all his instincts sang, turning his nerves into steel wires.

Nog looked at him and must have seen something in his eyes. He blinked, then swiveled in his chair. As an afterthought, he covered his exposed penis. Ray thought he had rarely seen anything more pathetic.

“It’s a silent alarm. The cops will be here any minute, Vance,” he said. He paused for a moment, Ray could tell he was thinking. When he went on, he sounded as if he spoke to himself. “You have to pay extra for that hook-up, you know. You have to pay the sheriff’s office, the phone company, and the alarm boys for that one.”

Ray nodded his head. He recalled a similar arrangement that protected the school datacenter when no one was present.

Nog ran a finger over the tire iron that pinioned his keyboard like a staked vampire. Ray walked out onto the balcony feeling stunned and deflated. He couldn’t quite attack Nog. He wondered if that made him an inferior creature, one that deserved to lose his only son. If he only understood Nog’s role, he told himself, violence would come easily. But without any real evidence... Looking out at the parking lot, he saw a squad car pull into the drive. The car’s lights were off. He shook his head, Nog hadn’t been shitting him about the alarm. He threw one leg over the railing.

“Vance,” he heard a voice call behind him. He glanced back into the dank room. The lights had been turned off again, leaving only the blue glow of the computer screens to silhouette Nog’s toad-like form.

“Log onto ‘No Carrier’, Vance. Look for someone with the handle: Santa.”

Ray breathed deeply, nodded over his shoulder, then dropped off the balcony.