The Debt Collectors War

Chapter 87

“See,” Terry said. “Something you need to see.”

Ellie shrugged. “All right. So…?”

“I need to show you,” Terry said. “I need to get something out my pocket.” He moved his hand towards his side, then stopped and waited.

Ellie nodded, watching him carefully.

Terry took a tablet out from inside his jacket. He took it out, slowly, and then showed it to Ellie, so she could see what it was.

Ellie moved as soon as she saw the tablet. She raised her sidearm, deliberately, and pointed at Terry’s face.

“Yeah,” she said. “I really don’t think so.”

Terry could have anything on that tablet. Remote trigger apps for bombs, or a messaging system to alert other militia cells that he had been raided, or apps which silently activated when the tablet was powered up, purging data or launching counterattacks against the sensor net. Even an app that automatically detonated explosives in the buildings all around them as soon as the tablet was switched on.

“Put it down,” Ellie said.

“It’s just a tablet,” Terry said.

“Put it down. Now.”

Slowly, Terry did. He laid it on the ground in front of him, then stood back up. “It will help if you just let me show you,” he said.

“Not a chance,” Ellie said. “And if you try and touch that tablet again before we’ve finished talking about this, I’ll kill you.” She kept her sidearm and pointed at him to make sure he knew she meant it. “What am I supposed to be seeing? On the off-chance I’m feeling stupid and decide to look?”

“A video of the boy you’re looking for. It might make this clearer for you.”

“It might,” Ellie said. “Except that it’s on that tablet. Which you aren’t going to touch.”

“I won’t,” Terry said.

“Don’t. Absolutely don’t.”

Terry nodded and stayed still. He seemed quite calm. He seemed to have no intention of trying to reach for the tablet again, which made Ellie feel a little calmer too. She stood there, thinking, watching Terry warily. They seemed to be at an impasse. She didn’t know what to do.

Ellie thought for a moment. “Is the video anywhere else?” she said. “A server on the internet, maybe?”

Terry looked over at someone else. The technical officer, Ellie assumed. Or the closest thing Terry had to one. She and Terry both looked over, but the tech officer didn’t answer.

“Tell her,” Terry said.

“It’s on a server,” the tech officer said, a little reluctantly.

“Do you know where?” Ellie said.

The tech officer nodded.

Ellie put away her sidearm, and took our her own tablet. She opened a browser window on it, and said, “If I go where you tell me and something bad happens to this computer…”

The tech officer shrugged.

“Do you understand?” Ellie said, sharply.

“Yeah.”

“And you’re still sure I should do this?” Ellie said. “Because if this goes wrong, if this is some elaborate way to infiltrate the corporate datanet, the consequences will involve your family, I promise.”

“Nothing will happen.”

Ellie stood there and looked at him. She waited. She tried to make him nervous.

She still had her e-glasses operating in their data view, so as she looked at him she saw his name floating superimposed beside his head. She tapped her comm, and gave the operations centre his name. She told them to look up his next of kin. The operations centre told her several names, and Ellie repeated those names out loud, and then their last known addresses. Then she said, “Are you still sure I should look at this website?”

The tech officer glanced at Terry, a little uncertainly, but then nodded.

Ellie decided he was telling the truth. Or he was committed enough to this trick that asking questions wasn’t going to help. “All right,” she said. “Tell me where to look.”

The tech officer gave her the name of a website, and then a username and password. The website was a blank login screen, an unconfigured host without logos or branding. Ellie typed in the user details she was told.

The login screen went away, and she saw a video. It was a file, ready to distribute, not something that was meant to play here.

“Should I play it?” she said, to the tech officer.

He nodded.

Ellie tapped the video file, so it opened. She let it run.

It was their kid, making a speech.

It was his martyrdom video.

Everyone had to make martyrdom videos now. Even debt-resistance militias who would probably be enslaving the hajjis themselves if they ever got their world back again.

It was the kid’s martyrdom video, and Terry was right. This whole situation was far, far worse than Ellie had expected.