[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Episode 5: End of Line, subtitle: DOS IT!
By Steve Jordan

1: Morning in Hollywood

Morning in Hollywood was developing into a nice one. The sun coming up over the California hills was bright, and a small and picturesque scattering of white clouds dotted the otherwise blue sky. Yup… one of those mornings that made California really shine.

Too bad I wasn’t in a mood to enjoy it.

That’s because I had been up all night, working. Me and my Toughbook had been going for hours, basically as soon as Gail, Mel Cooley (the accountant at Byers & Mig, not the guy from the old TV show) and I had returned from dinner the night before. And now that the sun was coming up, my eyes could barely stand it.

I blinked back against the beams of light that slotted between the curtains in Mel’s hotel suite, and glanced around. Mel was asleep in the other room (one of these days, I mused, I have to stay in a hotel room that doesn’t have a mini-fridge next to a twin bed). That was okay: He’d stayed up with me for a few hours, providing me his login and password to his Byers & Mig (or, as I liked to think of them, good ol’ BM) office servers, and then to help me find my way around his office’s servers. Once he’d done his bit, he’d gone off to get some shut-eye before his flight back to Baltimore this morning.

Across the main room of the suite, curled up on the couch and fast asleep, was Gail. There was something particularly fascinating about watching Gail sleep; for one thing, when it was night (and often during the day), the two of us were either both asleep, or wide awake and doing our damndest to wear each other out. It was a rare occasion when I was awake enough to actually see her sleeping.

And there was something else: The expression on her face was more relaxed and satisfied than I think I had ever seen it. When she had told me the story of how she and my brother Pete had broken up—seems like a whole episode ago, now—I remembered thinking at the time that it had been an incredible weight she’d been carrying around while we were dating, and I was sure unburdening herself would be a relief to her. In fact, her reaction when I assured her I understood, and didn’t blame her for what had happened, left me with no doubt that she had been dying inside over her side of the breakup. Getting my absolution had opened up the floodgates, both of relief, and then of passion… and boy, did I get drenched. Now, she slept the sleep of the truly contented and secure… the sleep of the loved.

Yeah. Back up and replay it, if you need to. I said it. I loved that woman, more than any other gorgeous rich nymphomaniac I had ever known. Personally. When awake.

Suddenly, a chance beam of sunlight slipped through the curtains and lit on her face, giving it an angelic glow. Somewhere in the back of my head, a choir began singing that single note in four-part harmony that they love in the movies. At that opportune moment, Gail stirred, and opened her eyes. It could have been the sun on her face… it could have been the holy choir leaking out of my thoughts… right now, I’d put money on either. At any rate, her eyes searched the room, and when they found me sitting at the desk not far from her, she smiled. One of those smiles that just makes a geek like me forget all about what I’d been doing all night, and remember the things I wish I’d been doing all night. She pushed herself upright on the couch, stretched (gad, I wish she hadn’t done that!), and whispered, “How’s it goin’, lover?”

I swear, I had to look down at my laptop to get a clue as to what I’d been doing up until then. When I finally remembered, I said, “It’s goin’.”

“That doesn’t sound so good,” Gail said, and came up off of the couch. She had slept in the dress she’d worn to dinner the night before, but somehow, she looked as neat and fresh as if she had just put it on. She came over to me, put a hand under my chin, and gave me a kiss that could have loosened fillings. When she pulled back, she said, “Having trouble?”

“Yes,” I said quickly. “Concentrating!” Gail smiled guilelessly, and backed off to take the seat next to mine at the desk. “I’ve been digging into anything I could find on the Merc program.” I didn’t have to elaborate: Gail now knew the Merc program was written by a company acquired by BM and designed to take advantage of some programming loopholes to con the NASDAQ system and make off with billions in instant profits. It had failed on BM’s first attempt to use it, and to cover their tracks, I had been randomly blamed for a denial of service attack on their servers, fired from my IT job, and blacklisted in my own home town. Gail and I also knew BM was planning to try again, and if I could play my cards right, I might be able to stop them, and get my reputation back.

And Gail knew the information I’d gotten from Mel was instrumental in my getting into their systems. Mel, having decided that he wanted nothing to do with BM’s little stock-swindle plot, was more than willing to help me out once we had all gotten together and compared notes. His password had allowed me to get at other computers at BM, to compare comments, notes, and the occasional debugging script, examine some output feeds, and in general collect every bit of information I could about Merc’s design and intent.

We heard the click of the bedroom door, and looked up. Mel was just coming out, already dressed, and with his suitcase in his hand. He looked at us at the desk, squinted at the rays of sunlight coming through the curtains, and said, “Morning. My flight east leaves in two hours. Do we have time for breakfast?”

Gail considered. “Better eat at the airport.”

I considered. “Works for me. I’m ready for a break, anyway.”

Gail stood up and said, “Mel, you get the rest of your stuff together and meet us downstairs. I’ll get my car and be waiting out front.”

“No problem,” Mel said, and watched me as I packed my stuff away. “Did you get anywhere last night getting into the B&M servers?”

“Been making good progress,” I said as I followed Gail to the door. On the threshold, I paused, and smiled at Mel. “Don’t worry: We’re gonna get ‘em.”

I waited until I had closed the hotel room door, leaving Mel inside, before I turned to Gail on the outside, and said, “I don’t know if I can get ‘em.”