Deathwatch (The Faded Earth Book 1)(59)
Beck heard the words, but she couldn’t truly process them. The concept was antithetical to everything the survivors of the old world believed. Everything precept their society was built upon. “Forty years,” she said. “That’s about how long we’ve been having blooms.”
Eshton shook his head. “Thirty-three. That’s how long ago the first one happened. This has to be Remnants. Some splinter group who hates the Protectorate, anyway.”
Parker’s brows knitted together. “I don’t know what that is, but unless they have access to a high-end laboratory, a lot of computing power, and the ability to turn into ghosts to slip through walls and inject people with Fade B, it isn’t them.”
Bowers’ head snapped up. “You’re sure?”
“I’m sure,” Parker said. “The resources required just to manufacture this thing are insane. Can you imagine someone creating this in some makeshift lab without fucking up at some point and accidentally exposing a huge population to it? Because I can’t. Something like this can’t be brewed up by just anyone. It took a team of fairly skilled engineers to make it happen. Even just maintaining production and making sure it doesn’t go wildly out of control is a big job.”
Fury etched lines in Bowers’ face, though Beck was certain it wasn’t directed at anyone present. “Say it plainly, Doctor.”
Parker spread his hands. “Someone with a lot of clout made this happen. Someone in your government is responsible for these blooms.”
Eshton slammed a fist down on the table. “Why? Why would anyone even imagine doing something like this?”
Maybe it was her recent education on the history of the Deathwatch, but Beck had a sudden flash of intuition as several facts surfaced in her mind. “Power. The Protectorate, at least Science and the Deathwatch, got more backing after the blooms started. They reinforce the power structure.”
Bowers hissed out a breath in an attempt to once more find his calm, with middling results. “Now we know why research within Science division has been hamstrung so quietly. Too hard a look will uncover what Doctor Novak worked out on his own. Someone is worried a cure will upset the status quo, and reveal this...fucking crime against humanity.”
Bowers shook with rage. Beck was angry—and sad, and horrified at the fresh memories of the infected she’d killed by the dozen, now aware the entire nightmarish experience was preventable—but she was only on the first steps of her path within the Watch. Bowers had decades of walking it behind him. She tried to imagine the depth of his fury at such a betrayal and came up short. She simply did not have the context or experience to properly gauge such a feeling.
The old man turned to her with fire in his eyes. “Park, I have your first assignment.”
Beck nodded. She had a shrewd idea what was coming.
Bowers thrust a finger toward the notes still sprayed across the terminal. “I want you to break into every secure system you have to, shadow every member of Science division from Chen on down, turn over every rock. I want you to find out the names of every person responsible for this, active or retired, living or dead. I want to know who is involved and I want to make them pay if I have to kill them by inches with my own hands.”
“You’re goddamned right I will, sir,” Beck said.
28
Being given super user access to the Deathwatch Mesh network was like being given a lifetime of birthday gifts all at once. Beck could access nearly anything connected to any network within the Protectorate by using the anonymous account created for her by Commander Bowers.
It was also far too much information for her to sort. She recognized at once that she lacked the investigative training needed to run down perpetrators. Eshton had to go through those advanced courses as a member of Enforcement, but he was still stuck at the lab.
So Beck attacked the problem as she did any other; by breaking it down logically. Treating the puzzle as nothing more than a system to be taken apart and understood, she then recognized several shortcomings in her approach.
The first was that she would need her armor to maintain anonymity when running down leads. The second was that the civilian Science division, or at least the parts she needed to look at, kept their networks separated from the Mesh.
Unsurprisingly, Deathwatch armor wasn’t designed to interface with computer systems through anything but the lightweight browsing and situational awareness functions needed in the field. There were no systems in place to allow for more in depth work like programming or hard line access to outside networks. Why would there be? The AI and firmware inside the armor could be updated and debugged over the air.
This oversight led to Beck spending four days in a workshop provided by an amused Bowers, where she made several upgrades. The upgrades led directly to her first stop in the investigation, which was the home of one Harry Gilman in Rez Shān. The place was on containment lock down, which meant no one in or out who wasn’t authorized. Using the access given to her, Beck registered as authorized to any Watchman who so much glanced in her direction. Their systems only recognized her as a member of the Watch, no ID signature, no files created on their hard drives.
Beck was rather proud of that part. It took the better part of a day to create the necessary triggers to force computer systems inside the Mesh to erase all evidence of her presence. Cameras, even on suits, would destroy any video of her that might be taken. Access logs would delete any entries made by her. It was not perhaps what Bowers intended when giving her control nearly equal to his own, but if confronted she would tell the truth.