Asterion Read Online Free PDF Page A

of the shielding.
    Taylor looks at Trent. “Who could have done this?”
    Trent shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know. We’ve never seen any strange people around the lab. It’s virtually just several people in this facility and we know them all. Do we tell Milar?”
    Taylor looks puzzled. “We have to. No matter what our suspicions are about her or anyone else, we have to report it. If anything, it will put a stop to any other efforts to spy on the project because they will know we are aware of the situation.” Taylor calls a meeting of the group including Devin and Milar.
    In the conference room, Taylor and Trent report their findings to the group. Devin listens intently, but does not go ballistic as Taylor expected.
    Devin turns to Milar. “Did the security measures fail us?”
    “We’ll go over everything in the security systems database, but my suspicion is this breach was already in place before I arrived. My personnel ran a fine toothcomb over the facility, but we omitted the instrumentation from the search. There was too much risk that our investigation could contaminate, alter or destroy the experiment. The implementation of the facility shielding probably ended any snooping.”
    She turned to Taylor and Trent. “Can you determine how much information was stolen?”
    Taylor reveals what they know so far. “Trent determined that a virus transmitted a complete backup initially and then incrementally after that. There have been over one hundred transmissions, so working backwards using the software logs we determined that this started approximately one month ago, or a week before you arrived.”
    Taylor looked at Trent for his response. “Whoever did this is clever. We chose the millimeter wavelength communication because of data bandwidth and it can’t travel far because ordinary walls easily stop it. The nano-mechs retransmitted what they received on a longer wavelength that could be transmitted some distance.”
    Milar looked at the assembled group. “We’ll make our best efforts to try to determine who might be the culprit, but it’s kind of like a radio transmission, it’s hard to determine who was listening.” With that said, the team returned to the lab.
    Taylor asked Christine and Trent, “You know what that means?”
    Christine sighs, “We have to do a complete check of all systems before we go live with the project.” Trent nodded in agreement.
    Taylor, taking a deep breath, prodded his team members, “let’s get started!’
    The intercom crackled into life with Devin’s voice calling, “Taylor, come to my office immediately.” Taylor left the lab and raced to Devin’s office.
    Entering, the back of Devin’s high back chair greets him.
    Devin slowly turns around in the chair. “Have a seat.” He waves his hand over the empty chair. Taylor sits down and waits for Devin to speak. “Any guesses on who might be spying on us?”
    Taylor tilts his head. “Hard to say, it could be anybody from other countries, competing businesses or even our own officials.”
    Devin cautions Taylor. “Well, if you find out anything else or have an idea who it might be, come and see me first. As Director, these are the kind of issues that can affect all our jobs.”
    Taylor smiles, “You got it!”
    “Good,” Devin smiled back. “I’ll let you get back to work; I know we are close to making this work. Good luck.” With that, Taylor returned to the lab to continue testing and validating the systems.
    The team works for the next week to make sure the project does not suffer any setbacks. They had a limited number of tries to be successful. After a week of long hours, Taylor decides to give everyone a break for the weekend and come back on Monday, fresh and ready to break new barriers. Taylor sees his opportunity and summons up the courage to ask Christine if she would like to go to dinner.
    Catching her in a quiet corner of the lab, Taylor looks at Christine nervously, “The bureaucracy allowed