Dot Com Boom

Anna Martinez

I worked out with Jake Chambers, my partner. We sparred in the FBI gym at the FBI headquarters in Washington D.C. between missions. We both had on full headgear and boxing gloves. I wore a black tank top and sweats, he was still in his dress clothes minus the blazer. He said he didn't sweat enough to take the time to change, and would only be helping me by serving as a punching bag for a few minutes anyway. It wasn't that great of a workout; Jake wasn't putting up much of a fight. You see, Jake is one of those nerdy types that are into computers, superheroes, and sci-fi, not that they can't be fit, but he wasn't. Seems like he can do anything when it comes to that stuff. I'm no slouch myself, but Jake, he's something entirely different when it comes to technology. He's scrawny and has the facial features of a goddamn skeleton. He's clean cut like most of the FBI boys around here. Dark and could-be handsome if he wasn't so scrawny. And lately he seems to be getting skinnier, don’t know how it's possible. I'm not one to judge, but he really should eat more and maybe pick up a weight once in a while.
I'm fit and tone, just got into working out the past couple of years. I like boxing the most. Taken martial arts, but that shits crazy. I'm not obsessed with fitness or anything, but I take care of myself. Am I beautiful? Hell, this is going sound a lot conceited, but I'm a fucking knock-out. Maybe it's just the self-confidence talking, working out will do that to ya. The endorphins rushing to my brain got me all fired up. Ask me any other time and I might be more modest. I've got dark brown hair with some highlights that I change the color of from time to time. Red. Blue. Green. Purple. Pink. Today, they're red. I know, not the image you see when you think of an FBI agent. I've got brown eyes and skin, and a fuckin' killer smile. I'm a badass Latina.
I knocked Jake on his ass and he was slow to get up. "C'mon we're not done," I said.
"Anna. I'm exhausted," he said.
"You haven't even done anything! God man, you can throw a punch, you know. You don't have to be afraid to hurt me. Don't just stand there with your hands up."
My therapist has a theory about why I started working out suddenly. It couldn't be because I wanted to be healthy, could it? Yeah, I suppose it could be, but he's right, I know it. It's all because of my little sister. She was always into fitness. She wanted to be a personal trainer to the stars. And she would have been too. She could do anything. She had that kind of attitude that wouldn't quit.
She's dead now. Fuck, I can feel the endorphins lessening already just thinking about it. She was 22 when she died. No. When she got raped and murdered. Fucking internet. Some scumbag lured her out using Tinder and killed my little Vanessa. Threw her in a dumpster outside a bar for the rats to nibble on before we found her. He was easy enough to catch, pulling up the chat records and tracking the phone, but goddamn, Why? Why the hell did he do it? For one night of fun? This world doesn't make sense sometimes.
She was so fucking sweet. It should have been me. I was the foul-mouthed one. I was the troubled one. I was the promiscuous one. But she was the trusting one, and that's what did it. Fucking internet.
I'm 33 years old. And I only joined the FBI sexual assault and violent crimes unit three years ago. It wasn't until Vanessa was killed that I got the ambition to do something that mattered. The ambition to catch the sick bastards that ruin other peoples' lives, that ruined my life, that stole Vanessa's life from her. So much potential, gone. Before the FBI I worked at the CIA. Stop right there, it's not what you're thinking. I wasn't some international spy. Heck, I barely left the office. I was a paper-pusher. It wasn't a bad gig, but largely inconsequential. After Vanessa, I just couldn't handle being that useless.
I helped Jake up from the ground, arm extended and locked, pulling him up with ease. Jesus. What the hell does he weigh? Has to be well below 200 and he's over six feet tall. What's wrong with him? Okay Anna, stop judging. He's a good guy. He's a great detective.
"You okay?" I asked.
"What do you mean?"
"You worry me sometimes. Disappearing on our assignments for long periods. Thin as a rail. You just worry me, okay. What's going on? Can't a partner be worried?"
"I'm fine, Anna."
Jake was always one to answer with the bare-minimum information. No elaboration. Nothing. Especially when questions came up about himself. It came to be expected. No matter how much I tried to get him out of his shell, he wouldn't budge. But whatever. He's a good guy. He's a great detective.



I got cleaned up and put on my suit. I hate suits. Luckily, FBI agents don't always wear them like in the movies, we wear what is right for the situation. My dark, fun but professional attire, mostly black, is normally okay for the types of cases I work on. I interview normal people in American cities. I work alongside local law enforcement. I don't need to look like some stuck-up snob and make my job even more difficult. The situation today is different. Donald Murphy, my boss has just called me and Jake to his office for an important meeting. We're getting our next assignment. I have a hunch on what it might be. There's been a serial killer releasing sexual videos online, at Amazon of all places. Three videos. Three people dead. Apparently, the videos just pop right up when browsing the site. News channels are making sure everyone knows what's happening. Amazon stock is plummeting as a result. I have yet to see one of the videos. And from what I've heard, I don't want to.
Shit, I thought, as I walked down the hall. Merv Dunham and Gregory Corban, the cockiest duo in all of the FBI. For good reason, I have to hand it to 'em they've brought down some really bad dudes. But still, they wouldn't let you forget it. Merv is an older man, grey and thinning hair, a big gut, white as Maine, and craggy as the Grand Canyon. But looks aren't everything. He's a hell of a detective. Most people attribute the duo's success to him, probably because of age. And who knows, he may be the driving force, but it isn't all his doing, Gregory has had a part in the success. That's obvious to anyone that knows a little about Merv's history before he became a bigshot. The man's old. He's been around forever. Longer than my boss Donald, even. Has to be close to retirement. And yet, all that time, and only recently he's started to see major success. Maybe he's learned from his experience, or maybe Gregory is the driving force. Or maybe, together, they're ying and yang (learned that from my martial arts class that I quit after three sessions, shits crazy, I'm tellin' ya), driving each other to be better.
Wish Jake and I were ying and yang. I feel like I'm doing cases alone sometimes. Should I report him to the Director? To Donald? Fuck, why is he putting me in this position? He's a good guy, and a great detective. I keep saying it, because it's true. When he's there.
Gregory's a cutey. He works out, unlike some people I know. And it shows. He's not a muscle head, not even close. Just nicely toned, black hair, olive skin, a well-trimmed beard over his strong jawline, and piercing light brown eyes. I think he's Greek. I could be into him if he weren't so cocky. He's 26, and got into the bureau at 23, that's the minimum age you can enter. We've been in the same number of years, but he's gotten a lot more accomplishments in that time. This is where I could blame it on him being a man, and I would if it were true. Not in this case. He knows his shit. Not that I don't, it's just he's got the ying and yang advantage too. But I'd never tell him any of this, he's got a big enough head already.
"Well if it isn't Anna and her flake, er I mean Jake," Gregory exclaimed as he blocked our way down the hall.
"Real mature, Greg," I said. "Move."
"It's Greg-Or-Y. We aren't there yet sugar tits."
"What the fuck?" I snapped.
"Just playin'. Jeez. Learned that one from Merv here." He tapped Merv on the shoulder. "Hey, Merv, remember that story you told me, isn't that one of the lines you used to use in the good ol' days?"
"I don't think that's acceptable anymore," Merv said.
"It was never acceptable," I said, shaking my head. Merv shrugged. Clueless old man. Then I met eyes with Greg-Or-Y. "Jesus fucking Christ, let us pass. How do you get anything done? You're so idiotic."
"You gotta go with the flow sweetheart. Don't take everything so seriously."
"Or just have Merv do all the work," I said. I know how to hurt this child.
"What did you say to me?"
"You heard me. Everyone knows it's all Merv. You're just along for the ride."
He slammed his hand into the wall over my shoulder. I recoiled, back to wall and looked up into his eyes. Fuck they were intense. He was intense. Our faces inches apart. I could feel his warmth. He didn't say a word. I didn't say a word. No one did. Then, as if he knew what he was doing was not even in the realm of right, he smiled and backed away, bowed and swung his arms, directing us down the hall.



Donald Murphy greeted us and ushered us into his office. He's about a fifty-year-old black man. His hair is trimmed in a box pattern about an inch high and is mostly grey. He's clean shaven. Body's your typical fifty-something, maybe fit at one time, but now letting himself go a little. He heads the sexual assault and violent crimes unit here in Washington D.C. He sat down behind his large mahogany desk, files stacked on it a foot tall. Jake and I took seat up front.
"The dot com killer. That's what the media is calling him," Donald said. "Heard of him?"
I nodded. "Of course, sir."
"I want you two to join the task force involved in taking this guy down."
"Why us?"
"What. You don't want in?"
"No. I want in. I definitely want in."
"This is a nightmare. Everything is out there. It's public. There's no possibility to withhold information. The videos are all over the net. We can't stop them anymore. People are afraid. They're afraid to go online. They're afraid to step outside. That’s after four killings."
"Four?" I asked. "Was three just this morning."
"He moves quick. I know the third just showed up yesterday, but today, just an hour ago, another video surfaced."
"Is he still targeting Amazon?"
"Yes. That hasn't changed. I predict he'll target it until it's dead and gone."
"How? How can this be? How can we not track him? How is he logging into a company's servers and not being detected?"
"We can track him, but it takes time, a lot of time. He's apparently a genius. Whatever method he is using to hack into the site is homebrew. He uses layer after layer of code meant to waste our time in tracking him. We're working on ways to speed up the process.
"So, we know where the uploads originated from at least?"
"Please excuse me," Jake said. He got up and left the room. There goes my yang.
"Is he okay?" Donald asked.
I covered. "I think he ate something that didn't agree with him today."
Donald nodded.
I repeated. "So, we know where the uploads originated?"
"Yes. That's all in the file." He got a somber but serious look on his face. He was a serious guy anyway, not sure he even knew how to laugh, but this was a new level of seriousness. "Anna. This last killing is putting the pressure on big time. Media is screaming for justice, and people are reacting in kind. Social media is going crazy. #dotcomkiller is trending with more tweets than any in history. We need to catch this guy. And fast."
"What's different about the last killing?"
"He had killed two female street workers and a pimp before this. Not saying no one cares about those people, but they didn't get outcry like the latest one. The latest is a little girl, only 10 years old."
I lost my breath. "And he did those things to her that I read about the other videos?"
Donald looked down. "I'm afraid so."
"I'm going to be sick."
"I would be too if I hadn't already been. Go on, Anna, you're dismissed." Donald got up and opened the door for me as I held my breakfast down. The things I'd read that the killer did in those videos. My God. I was sick just from imagining it. But I would have to watch the videos. All of them. Over and over. I was not looking forward to that. Crime scenes. Photos. That's what we were usually left with. And they have a gruesomeness to them, but to actually have to watch those things take place and not just the result made me almost hurl a projectile right out that door and all over Greg-Or-Y. That wouldn't have been the worse turn of events, he deserved it, but I managed to hold it down.
"Donald, what case did you give them?" Gregory asked. He had been waiting for his meeting with Donald.
"Not that it's any of your business, but Anna and Jake are assigned to the dot com killer case."
"What? Why? We should be on that! They're losers. What, you don't want it solved or something? Is there something we should know Don?"
Donald stepped out of his office. Stepped in front of Gregory. "I'm going to forget that you said that."
Gregory backed down immediately. "Sorry. I'm really sorry. I was out of line."
"You bet your ass you were." Donald said to Gregory. "Come in,” Then he looked at me with a pleading stare that I took as: we need this killer caught yesterday.