At Wit's End (7 page)

The naivety of people generally annoyed him. They left passwords lying around or used easy ones or the same one for every account. He had little patience for people who whined that they had gotten “hacked” when they hadn’t changed a password in a year. Basic internet safety dictated otherwise, something Wit considered common sense.

He couldn’t blame Marie for what had happened to her, however. Sometimes a person still bumped into an old fashioned con man
and that’s what she had done except the guy had used modern tools instead of the old real estate scams or others like it.

In the bad old days before Wit had put on the white hat he would have given the guy props for the audacity of the plan. Now, however, he wanted to make the guy pay and the price was going to be high. His fingers tapped to the beat of the music as he went in search and, all the while, he thought about the things he was going to do to “Michael”. The guy would never know what hit him.

The attachment came in the morning. Wit read the short email Marie had sent and then opened the file. The picture had been taken near a river in a forest. Bright sunshine gleamed off the water and shot highlights through the blond hair on the man standing with his arm around Marie.

They wore matching khaki shorts and some sort of canvas shirts, his green, Marie’s a pale blue that made her eyes sparkle. In the corner of the frame Wit could see part of a tent and the man held a fishing pole in a tanned hand which told Wit they’d been on a camping trip. Duh.

A vague feeling of jealousy stirred. This schmuck had been spending time with an amazing woman and not only had he thrown it away, he’d abused the trust she’d given him. Wit wanted to punch that smirking face.

Over the past few nights he had been following a rat’s maze of digital paper linked to the bank account numbers Marie had given him. He’d gone through enough energy drinks to have his hands shaking as he reached for a bottle of water but he was sure he’d found the jerk now.

On the second of the five screens he had a driver’s license photo with which to compare the likeness. With a few clicks of the mouse Wit cropped and enlarged the image and compared the two screens. “Gotcha,” he whispered.

Wit pushed away from the desk and leaned back in his chair. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at the screen with satisfaction. The man known as Michael was blond in the picture with Marie though, apparently, that wasn’t his natural hair colour. In the New Jersey driver’s license photo he had dark hair.

“Hello, James Alan Brandt, it’s going to be such a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Wit leaned forward and tapped a few keys. The windows closed and he turned his attention to the screens on the right. He had to run a test to ensure the patch he’d used to tie Byte’s code to his own would hold before he’d be ready to officially try his new program. After striking the last key a countdown timer appeared in the lower right corner. It told him he had five hours until the test would be complete.

Wit stood up from his desk and stretched. He’d been sitting for far too long. His eyeballs were pulsing with the side effects of the energy drinks and if he didn’t get out of this room and do
something
he was going to have to peel himself off of the ceiling.

Following an impulse Wit sent a text to Marie.
Following your advice, going for a run. Want to join me?

Her reply came quickly.
You read my mind. Meet you at the north entrance?

K.

The air felt heavy and gre
y clouds lay thick across the sky. Weather forecasters had been calling for a thunderstorm through the morning hours and it did seem that fat drops of rain might start falling at any time.

Normally the park would have been busy with lunchtime picnickers, other joggers and, of course, the occasional drug deal. The lunch carts were out but business was slow today with the vendors already wrapped in ponchos.

Wit wasn’t afraid of a little rain and apparently Marie wasn’t either. She stretched with enthusiasm, her eyes alight with pleasure. Wit stretched next to her with far less enthusiasm. Sometimes following an impulse could bite you in the butt, he thought.

“I haven’t gone out for a run in a while. Not a real one,” she told him. “The treadmill in my building’s gym isn’t the same.”

“There is something about having actual terrain under your feet,” Wit agreed. “Why don’t you lead?” The path was narrow and one of them would have to set the pace.

Marie started moving toward the path. “How about five miles?” she called over her shoulder.

Wit merely blinked. “How about seven?”

Marie laughed. “Three it is,” she agreed and set off.

The thick humidity weighed Marie’s limbs down and she immediately felt her body warm up and grow loose. She picked a steady pace and veered left when the option arose. This path wound through wooded areas and had actual inclines though Marie wouldn’t count them as hills.

Sounds of the city crept through the trees and reminded Wit that life always continued on no matter how lost in his own world he might be. Horns honked in traffic and the hydraulic brakes on delivery trucks squealed. People’s voices were raised in conversations on their cell phones creating a low song all its own.

Wit started out strong. Halfway through their loop he felt his air begin to go. As she ran ahead of him Marie’s ponytail bobbed in a rhythm Wit found distracting and he focused on it, allowing his mind to drift as the curly tail swayed side to side.

The bench beckoned. Wit could see it when they were a tenth of a mile out. He would have sworn there was a golden glow around it letting him know the glorious feeling of sitting was but a few moments away.

Sweat dripped into his eyes and he could feel it streaking down his back. He silently cursed the humidity and then accepted the blame. It was no one’s fault but his own that he was out of shape. He looked at Marie and realized she was barely breathing heavier than normal.

“You make me feel like a slob,” he panted behind her.

“You look like you’re in better shape than you are,” she commented. “It wouldn’t take much work at all to whip you back into shape.”

“A whipping is what it’s going to feel like tomorrow.” He slowed his pace and walked several large circles to cool off. A cart caught his eye. “Can I buy you a hotdog? Or ice cream?” he asked hopefully.

“Did you skip breakfast this morning?”

“That would assume I woke up this morning. Technically, with the schedule I’ve been keeping, this would be dinner.”

“In that case, I’d love a hotdog.”

They sat on the bench with their nitrate enriched lunch. Marie thought nothing had tasted better and, by the look on Wit’s face, he would agree.

“What have you been working on?” she asked him. A bit of relish fell onto her hand and she wiped it carefully with one of the many napkins they’d taken from the dispenser.

Wit swallowed a huge bite and washed the dryness of the bun down with water. “Your project, actually.”

“Oh, really?” Marie had nearly forgotten.

“I think I found your Michael,” he told her. “Assuming everything works like I expect it to I should have more information for you tomorrow.”

Marie gaped at him. “That’s amazing. Do you know where he is?”

“He lives in New Jersey and his name isn’t Michael. It’s James Alan Brandt. And he’s not blond, by the way.”

“Did you go see him?”

“No, I found his driver’s license picture online and compared.”

“That sounds vaguely illegal.”

“I won’t tell if you don’t,” he promised her. “I would have had this information sooner but I’ve been working on another project that will tie into this one. It will take searching for people online to a whole new level.”

Marie finished her bun while she thought about what he had said. “It’s pretty easy to enter someone’s name into a search engine and find out way too much about them. Privacy is melting away.”

Wit grunted in agreement.

“How does your search take it to a new level?” she was curious.

“Well, as it is right now, you can go to Google or something similar and search for a person. You’ll get all sorts of results and they’re generally all over the spectrum,” Wit started.

“Things like their Facebook page, the white pages with their phone numbers, criminal checks and things like that,” Marie said, slightly unsure of her footing on technical grounds.

“That’s exactly right. There’s no real compilation. You have to sort through and take whatever the search engine gives you. Some of those are going to be pay sites and they’ll pop up higher on your list. We have to pay for the free search engines somehow.”

“I had always wondered about that.”

“What my program does is search every single database it can.
IGGY goes through firewalls and any other security it has to in order to find every piece of information possible on a subject.”

“What do you mean?”

“Say I put your name in, with your social security or driver’s license number. IGGY will search
everything
. If your elementary school has digitized their records, it will find that.”

“Remember what I said earlier about things that sound vaguely illegal?”

“Oh, it blatantly is,” he told her with some pride. “It knows every secret I do, every back door and has access to databases that would make your brain bleed to think about. I’ve been collecting access all my life and now it’s all coming to fruition through IGGY. No secret will be safe from me.”

“It sounds like a basic search engine,” she told him, “with better access.”

“It’s so much more than that,” he told her. “Once it has finished its search it compiles a report. The kind of detailed report that could tell me exactly where someone might be located at any given moment.”

“It sounds like something the government has.”

“You’re thinking of the Echelon system. There are conspiracy theories galore about that, including that our government is spying on our own citizens.”

“Yes, I’ve heard about that.”

“Echelon is for communications. Emails, faxes, phone calls, like that. IGGY is so much more than just communication though it is designed to go through those, also.”

“The very thought of this is making my head hurt. What else is in the report?”

“Okay, say you’ve got a guy making suspicious purchases. IGGY searches his entire life and can give me statistics about what crimes this guy is about to commit with the purchases, be they potential terrorist activities, drug running, child molestation, anything. I think it could tell me the likelihood of someone jay-walking.”

Marie thought about the entirety of what he’d said. “Wit, I’m not sure if I still want to do this.”

“Do what?” his words were muffled by hotdog.

“I don’t know that I want to invade his life, etc. It feels like bad karma or something.”

Wit stared at her. “And it wasn’t bad karma for him to steal all of your money? What about your company? You know, the one that you’ve been dreaming about for at least 5 years?”

Marie shook her head. “I want my money back. However I’m not sure this is the way to do it. Now that I know who he is I can go to the police.”

“They may not do anything with the information. As you pointed out, some of it was not attained legally.”

“What about the famous anonymous tip?”

“For something less than a million dollar heist?” This time Wit shook his head. “Think about it, let me know what you want to do. Okay?”

“You won’t do anything without my say so?”

“I’m not planning on it.” The silence they sat in was now vaguely uncomfortable. There was a new heaviness to the air and Wit didn’t like it. He searched for something with which to change the subject. “Do you have any events coming up?”

Marie’s foot swung idly under the bench. “I’m putting together a small engagement party tomorrow night.”

“Very nice. Where will that be?”

“On the rooftop of The Arms building.”

Wit looked sideways at her. “Definitely moving up in the world. Pun intended but with regret.” When she laughed lightly Wit felt the air around them lighten. “The Arms, that’ll work out great. I assume you’d like to use my kitchen?”

She paused. “I hadn’t considered that. It would be convenient.”

“For me, as well. As a lowly assistant I have to think about the cost of the commute. It’s nice when your job can come to you.”

“As you’d well know.” They shared a grin.

“What time should I expect you tomorrow?”

“We start prep at 3:00, Galley Slave.”

“Aye, aye, Captain.”

The printer hummed and shook on the small wooden stand in the corner of the simply designed room. Pages dropped neatly into a cardboard box placed at the base of the stand. Wit peered around the monitors and saw the box was nearly half full. Huh. He’d have to figure out a way to make the reports smaller, somehow print only the more relevant sections. He quickly tapped out a few reminders in the program’s notes and went back to reading the same report on screen.

Weston Manning had excellent credit. He had three major credit cards, used each of them regularly and paid off the bills in a prompt manner. His home had a $89,452 mortgage on it. His interest was slightly high but apparently he’d opted out of refinancing when that was the craze and had actually come out even when the housing bubble burst.

He’d had an excellent GPA in high school and had lettered in track. He had no Facebook or MySpace account but not everyone did. He’d filed his taxes as a Single for the past seven years and Weston had paid off his car loan just last month.

IGGY
’s final paragraph had Wit’s attention.

All sources indicate a law abiding citizen. Due to insufficient data
IGGY cannot prove this individual exists. Further research is required.

Wit wondered how much information the program would need before it believed Weston Manning to exist. Mostly because he didn’t. Wit had invented the alternate ID while he’d been in the islands and he’d basically created the man out of digital paper. He thought he’d gone deep enough to pass scrutiny. If his program didn’t have any bugs then he’d been wrong.