UNDERCOVER - Dark Fire Data (Book 3)

Part 15 - Oppy - Uber Computer

'But, Denny,' I interrupted, 'There's a good chance that Murga altered Oppy's software.'

'And, what about those guys on Parliament Hill?' Licia asked.

'I have no blooming clue who those blighters were. Oppy has found nothing and Dr Genius Zhang is as baffled as I am. Maybe we should talk to your friend Onderdonk. How do we contact him?'

'He answers to Triple Oh or Ondy,' I reminded him as I rolled up my sleeve to reveal the soft metallic band. 'I don't know how to contact him but he gave me this transponder so that he could find me.'

'A transponder?' Deny asked. 'This is all so blinking incredible. I just don't know what to say. You know as much as I do.'

We were all silent for a moment until Miguel asked, 'Are you going ice yachting again?' Denny grinned. 'There's too much snow on the lake ice right now. I'm thinking I should get a 'chute and a snow board. The parachute sailors were having ball the last time I looked.' 'Anyway, about Sam. He has only the boiler suit he was wearing when he arrived and my clothes are too big for him. Would you mind taking him to one of the shopping centres and buying him some stuff. I don't have the time. I'll supply the money.'

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The next morning, when Licia, Miguel and I arrived at Silverwood School, we went directly to Dr Zhang's office. He didn't seem pleased to see us. 'Happy new year,' we chorused as we looked around for somewhere to sit. 'Ah-um. Well it's not quite new year,' he muttered as he poured tea from his vacuum flask into a plastic mug. He had added a wide screen monitor to his office which was already crammed with computers so there was barely enough room for his executive chair and a stool. We had to used some ingenuity to find a place to sit where we could all see the monitor. 'Ah-um, so what do you want now?' he asked.

'Cookies would be good,' Miguel suggested. Dr Zhang gestured at the cupboard and Miguel took the box of fortune cookies down while I related my latest encounter with Andy, Con, Kozak and Triple Oh. Dr Zhang kept typing notes on his computer keyboard so that Oppy, his hyper-fast, know-it-all quantum computer, would know what we were talking about. Unfortunately, Oppy had a habit of interrupting any conversation with rude remarks.

'Kozak told me Murga is anxious to find Mr Bragg, our landlord,' I said. 'He was not pleased about losing the isotopes and wanted him to get more.'

Will you idiots please explain precisely which radio isotopes. Oppy displayed on the monitor.

I sighed. 'We think it was Strontium-90 intended for a terrorist bomb.'

 You might have said that earlier. Oppy interrupted.

'Kozak confirmed Mr Bragg was spying on you,' I told Dr Zhang.' 

 I could have told you that months ago.

'It seems Mr Bragg might also have scrambled the code that Murga needs to get back to his time of origin.'

 You are wasting my time. I have twenty nine algorithms to analyze. Wait a millisecond, who are Andy and Con?

 'We think they are private detectives,' I explained. 'They claim to have arrested Mr Bragg.'

'We saw him outside the school,' Licia added, 'just before we arrived on the Titanic and no one has seen him since.'

 'I thought he might have gone through the electric bookcase,' Miguel said. 'But we didn't see him on the Titanic.' 

 The electric bookcase was Denny's code word for Oppy's time phase link, we believed it was a nexus with the past.

Oppy interrupted. Who is this Triple Oh, again?

'His name is Olaf Oscar Onderdonk also known as Ondy. He works for the Time Agency, a future police service that controlled the illegal use of time shifting. He's trying to arrest Murga.'

'Ah-um, what do you know about the . . . er . . . bundlers who tried to kidnap me.'

'Murga needs the electric bookcase because the Time Agency stopped him using his own nexus,' I pointed out, 'but Triple Oh says the bunglers do not work for Murga.'

'Ah-um,' Dr Zhang interrupted. 'He can't use the electric bookcase. Oppy's has shut it down for the vacation and Denny has it in pieces.'