CyberStorm by Matthew Mather

Author:Matthew Mather [Mather, Matthew]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Day 13 – January 4

“PUT THIS OVER your nose and mouth,” I offered, handing Chuck a bandana.

I already had one around my face, and it wasn’t for the cold.

It stank outside.

The temperature had climbed into the high forties, and under bright, blue skies and sunshine the melting snow had turned the tracks down the middle of the streets into slushy, brown rivers. We’d given up on the skis for this foraging trip, opting instead for thick rubber boots. The smell was nearly as bad as the latrines on our fifth floor.

“Lauren did have a point yesterday,” I continued as I watched Chuck tie up the cloth. He looked like a criminal with the bandana and sunglasses on, hiding his face.

I’d gotten an earful from Lauren the night before about setting up our own private spy agency. While we obviously needed to keep track of Paul and Stan, she was adamant that we not use it to spy on other people without their knowing. Try as I might, I couldn’t help feeling suspicious about her motives, wondering if she was trying to hide something from me.

She’d made me promise to bring the point up with Chuck.

“It’s wrong to spy on our neighbors,” I continued halfheartedly. “It’s exactly what we were talking about.”

“Don’t you want to know where Paul and Stan are?”

We trudged a few more steps through the granular snow at the side of the slushy main path, sinking calf deep on each step. Every now and then my foot would sink especially deep and I’d have to carefully pull it out, usually ending with a wedge of dirty snow packed into my boot.

My feet were soaking wet.

“Of course, but it’s not the same as spying on our neighbors.”

“How’s it different if we know one of them is working with the bad guys?”

“Because you don’t know,” I replied. “You’re seeing conspiracies, exchanging someone else’s freedom to feed your paranoia.”

“Paranoia, huh? Look who’s talking. You’re still thinking Lauren is doing something behind your back.”

Sighing, I said nothing.

We walked quietly for a block.

The warm weather brought a lot of people outside, some wandering aimlessly, but most searching, scavenging. Through the broken windows of shops, we could see people picking through the empty shelves, searching for anything left behind. People were making an effort to pile trash bags together, and hills of them were growing at the intersections, glued together by windblown snow and debris.

I noticed that cables were strung from buried cars into the first-floor windows of a few apartments down the street. This was another one of Vince’s ideas—to turn on cars and use them as electrical generators. The idea had spread quickly on the meshnet.

“You know, we need criminals,” I said.

“We need criminals?”

“Society needs criminals. Without them, we’d be finished.”

Chuck laughed. “Now this I have to hear.”

“Any game theory simulation of society is more robust if you include a criminal element.”

“Simulation, huh?”

“The criminals force society to improve. They weed out the weak, making us strengthen our institutions and networks.”

“So they’re the wolves and we’re the lambs?”

“Sort of.

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