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I ran the whole way back to the office. Inside, both Eddie and Brandon were looking for me.

"Did you see what happened man?" Brandon.

'"Yeah I did. I was there when it happened, man, how could I not see it?"

"Its all over the news, dude. What happened?" Eddie.

"Alright you two, calm your tits, let's sit down and talk. Go get the chief as well, and put Liddell on the phone. Conference room, five minutes, I need to collect my thoughts."

The five minutes came and went, and soon everyone was seated and Liddell was on speaker. I briefed the group on what just happened, how White Light had taken over my phone and how he'd manipulated the lights and the shutters, how he'd boasted about being able to control the entire city's power grid. Needless to say, everyone was stunned. I could hear Liddell's surprise over the phone, the silence was very telling. After a while of no one speaking, I broke the silence.

"I think its safe to say we just got assfucked, gentlemen."

"How the hell did this prick get control of the power grid?" Martinez.

"Obviously he's had a lot of time to prepare. He must already have the systems under his thumb, just had no one to show it off to." Liddell, coming in tinny over the phone.

"Well I did essentially tell him the FBI's after him, he already knows, but he's holding out."

"Why?" Brandon.

"He must like the attention. People like him are attention seekers, have power but no one to show off to. He needs to get his rocks off somehow." Eddie.

"And the only way is to harrass us and potentially harm innocent civilians. Brilliant."

"We need to catch this guy, pronto." Martinez.

"I have an idea." Liddell.

All attention turned to the phone.

"Do tell."

"Well, here's what I was thinking: we have a very good tech here in the office down in Federal Plaza, he's the one that pulled the preliminary trace on White Light that Agent Husher requested earlier today."

Brandon grinned and placed the manila folder on the table. It changed hands several times as Liddell spoke.

"What I can have him do is to analyse your phone, not internally, we can't risk compromising our own internal security systems, but he'll use an outside computer to check it. Once he's identified the type of software and worm our man is using to control your phone, I'll ask him to duplicate it but add several countermeasures, mostly against the stuff he deploys. What you'll end up with is a phone that can essentially control the city, but only if its been tampered with. If he happens to hack into your phone again, it'll also trace his IP address and log it into our system. We'll do our own manual trace from there and establish a proper link with his terminal and pinpoint it on a map for you using GPS. After which you can locate where the signal's coming from, and by extension find our man."

"This sounds mighty complicated, Liddell. Are you sure it'll work?"

"Positive. We've tried several attempts at replicating his traces and hacking routines to no avail, but now that you have a copy of what he's used, we can analyse that, deconstruct it to see how it works, then reconstruct it and replace it on your phone to help our investigation instead of help him. This could be our only shot at nabbing our guy, Anderson."

"Alright. Just give me a time and place and I'll be there."

The meeting concluded shortly thereafter, with Liddell promising to update me on the situation soon before he hung up. I caught Brandon looking at me as I rose to return to my desk.

'"You okay pal? You look shaken, not stirred."

"Very funny. I was in fear for my life man, see how that feels."

"I know the feel, don't worry. We'll nab the sod, I know we will."

My hands were still shaking. I could feel the fear, feel it creeping into my conscious. But I didn't let it control me. I wanted to catch this guy as much as everyone else did.

---

"Phone?"

I put the thing in his palm, happy to be rid of it for even a short while. He took it, looked it over and gave a satisfied nod.

"Thanks. I always liked Sony phones."

He withdrew a cable from his bag and connected my phone to the library computer, then plugged a thumbdrive into the second slot and sat down.

Michael Fimberley was the cyber defense technician that helped us get a preliminary trace on White Light, a lanky young man with dark brown hair and blue eyes, he was apparently the smartest in the department at this computer tomfoolery. I stood behind him and watched as he opened up my phone's virtual insides on the screen, searching through files upon files upon files, looking for that one little marker that was the hack file. The thumbdrive contained backup files and other securities measures to protect the library's system from intrusion, along with a few countermeasures against the stuff within the hack.

"Now, cyber security's been beefed up a lot since a few years ago, but this shouldn't be difficult at all. All I need to find is a file that was added later than the rest of your system files and we'll be good!"

He clicked away at the keyboard for several minutes, obviously engrossed in his work. I let him be and wandered the library. It wasn't a big one, one of those small corner stores that springs up every now and again like flowers in a field. Just two blocks down was the precinct and the office, and further down was my home. I slowly paced the shelves and hummed a little ditty to myself, one of those old songs from times past, 1970s I think. I thought we were alone, so what I didn't expect was to hear humming in response to mine, from shelves further down. I slowly traced the humming, not knowing its source, but the tune was still familiar. Down the aisles I went, until I bumped into the person who was making the humming.

You know how people like to say that the world we live in is a small one? Well I could say the same thing.

A pair of chirpy green eyes stared up at me from beneath a shock of light brown hair, and the lady underneath that petite face gave me a tight hug as she smiled up at me. I stared back down at her Black Sabbath shirt and spiked choker and remembered who she was.

"Connie?"

"Daniel!"

I was surprised. Not only had Brandon followed me here from Britain, looks like the librarian followed me here too. I gave her a squeeze back as she giggled and stood back.

"Oh how'd you find me? I thought you lived somewhere else in New York!"

"Well I live down the street, Connie, but why are you here?"

She gestured to the library and smiled.

"Well I decided to move my bookstore here after I kinda lost the revenue I needed to maintain it back in London. I thought I'd do better here, and hey maybe I'd bump into you."

"Well you just did, little lady, nice to finally see you again after all these years."

"Yes, yes! We have so much to catch up on, I have to brew tea and-"

She gave me a look.

"You came in with another young man earlier, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I did. I'm, uh, here on business, sorry. Needed to use a computer."

She cocked her head to the side and raised a brow.

"Funny, I thought you police types had computers in your offices these days."

"We do, its just that, well, mine's broken."

"Oh, well feel free then!"

Connie drew in closer to me.

"And, um, I never got the chance to say this, but I'm sorry for your loss, Danny."

Her use of my nickname drew daggers in my heart, but I quelled the pain and smiled.

"Thanks Con. Its been a long time, and I'm trying to get over it, but thanks anyway."

"Any time, luv."

She stood on her tiptoes and gave me a quick peck on the cheek.

"Now, I'll go put some tea on, in case you boys are staying long, and I'll be right back!"

She scurried off, making me wonder how a woman with that many piercings and a love for black was so cheerful. I sighed and smiled to myself, before threading my way back to Fimberley was working. He'd already finished, apparently, and was thumbing through a copy of the Times until he saw me coming. He kept the papers and turned back to the computer, waving his hand at the monitor as I drew close.

"So, while you were gone, busy, I assume, I managed to find the file our hacker was using to remotely access your phone. Turns out, you were the one that seated it in your phone. Didn't anyone ever tell you not to open mysterious messages from strangers?"

He cocked a brow at me. I gave him a look and the brow lowered.

"Right, well, with the modding software I have on hand, I rewrote the root file to deny him access, then I wrote in some new lines of code that give me access to your phone whenever I want, but only if I have my thumbdrive around."

I cocked my brow at him instead.

"Don't worry, Daniel, I'm not going to spy on you when you're not working. I'm simply going to use the new file to monitor your phone's traffic. I've left the original worm file in your phone too, so whenever White Light decides to come a knocking, I'll be notified about it and I'll be able to run a trace ASAP. Once I triangulate his location and pinpoint an address, I'll send it to the team. They'll mobilise and come down hard on our guy, but once they're done, I'll send you a notification that he can also see, obviously. A little surprise for our 'big man'."

He hooked his fingers in quotation marks and grinned. He tapped a few keys and then disconnected my phone from the computer. I turned it on and watched the familiar interface boot up again as he packed up.

"I also hardcoded some improvements to your phone. After this operation's done, give me your phone again and I'll remove the worm file and my modded control, and you'll have your phone all to yourself again. With some, uh, added features."

He gave me a wink and I shuddered.

"Why do I not trust the integrity of these 'added features'."

"Hey if you don't want 'em give me your phone and I'll delete the entire shebang."

"Would you all like some tea?" Connie, back again, with a teapot, three teacups, a small bowl of sugar cubes and a pot of cream, all on a very cute looking tray.

Me and Fimberley exchanged looks.

---

I returned to the office an hour later, appetite sated by Earl Grey tea and muffins, a Subway sandwich sitting in a bag I carried with me. Fimberley had gone back to his office roughly five minutes into the impromptu tea time, so I'd spent time with Connie, catching up and talking shop. After we'd gone through the whole pot I'd bid her farewell and gone on my way, stopping by a Subway nearby to grab some lunch. As I walked into the office, Brandon came up to me.

"What took you so long, mate? Got caught up by books?"

"No, but you won't believe who owns the place."

"Lay it on me."

"Your old neighbour."

"Con? Really?"

"She gave me tea."

I showed him the little triangular sachets of tea I'd brought back with me and he grinned.

"That's Con alright, no one else I know uses those weird triangular tea bags. Why's she here?"

I recounted my story to him over my sandwich and Coke, and as I dusted crumbs from my chest he folded his arms and sighed.

"And here I thought she'd survive there. Guess I was wrong."

I shrugged.

"Hey, its good to have more people you know around you, eh?"

"Too true. Hey, speaking of which, I've been looking for you, or rather Eddie's been looking for you. Its about our guy."

"Where's he now?"

Brandon hooked a thumb in the direction of the conference room.

"In there, talking with the chief and our man, Liddell. Sounds heated, from the looks of it."

I nodded and went in. The three of them were in a heated discussion, alright, and as I stepped into the room things were apparently getting hotter. Eddie slammed his hand down on the conference table, making the phone seated there jump an inch into the air before clattering back down.

"No, damn it! I did not compromise the case!"

"Yes you did, Detective, like I said, after you unknowingly divulged information about it on the Internet."

"I was trying to attract his attention man! How the hell was I supposed to know that he had eyes and ears everywhere?"

"It was the assumption from the get go, Detective, now stand down."

"I-"

Eddie gave up, a look of frustration on his face. I took a seat beside him.

"Relax, bud. Let's see if I can sort things out."

Liddell apparently heard that.

"Anderson? Good thing you're here now, please explain to your partner how much he's screwed up."

"What I-"

"Enough! Both of you! Jesus H Christ, not one minute and already you two are bickering again like a married couple, stop it already and let me get the story straight!"

When I saw that Eddie had calmed down, I sat up.

"Now, tell me what happened Eddie."

"Alright, well I was surfing the net, right? You know how we were looking for him online, using all those social media sites and what not? I posted that the guy we were looking for was apparently wanted by the FBI, like I didn't know and was spreading the news. Apparently Agent Liddell here didn't like it, thought I was jeopardising the mission!"

"Detective Riggs was risking our entire operation by letting slip he was under FBI surveillance, that was something I simply could not tolerate and I merely wished to remind him to not do it again."

"You threatened to get me off the case, you jackass!"

"And if the both of you don't quiet down in the next five seconds I am going to take you off the case, Riggs, so settle down!" Martinez, from his seat at the head of the table. He was clearly fed up with the proceedings, and I could tell from the way his fingers drummed on the desk.

"Alright gentlemen, let's not argue any more. I agree, what Eddie did was slightly wrong."

Before he could object I cut him off and kept going.

"However, threatening my best friend isn't something you'll do without consequences, Liddell. Need I remind you that we're the liasons between you and the force, and if I don't like anything you're doing, I can bring it up with the higher ups and you won't see the light of day again."

Liddell shut up. I thought he'd disconnected but I heard the sound of his breath, obviously angry, from the phone's speaker.

"Good, now that we're all settled, let's take this in the right direction. I suggest that, instead of shutting down this avenue, we let it simmer and wait for some good results instead. Publicity is what we need, and social media achieves those results the best. You even suggested this avenue, Liddell, and I'm honestly curious to the results. If we get more hits on White Light by connecting with his peers or even his clients, then he'll have nowhere to run. He'll have to contact me again, and this time I'm ready for him."

"Our tech fitted your phone with his tracking software?"

"Yup. Did it just an hour ago. He should be back already."

"That's something else I wanted to bring up, Anderson. He's not back."

I paled.

"Wait, what do you mean he's not back?"

"After you finished, the two of you left, right?"

"We took a few minutes to thank the owner of the library, then he left, yeah."

"Well after leaving, approximately five minutes later we lost contact with Agent Fimberley."

Shit.

"Liddell, I'm sure you have access to the city's traffic cameras from your end, right?"

"Yes, yes, I'm getting there, Anderson, just let me finish. We used footage from the cameras around the area to determine where he went and what happened to him, and what happened wasn't pretty. Just after he left, he turned right and went down the street to his motorbike. He got on, started it, and left. Ten minutes later, he apparently ran a red light and was struck by a bus coming across the road."

Shit shit shit.

"I-is he okay?!"

"He'll live, though he'll be hospital bound for a while."

"Was it his doing?"

"We checked the footage of the intersection in question, and it appears to have been his doing. Shortly before Agent Fimberley's approach, we witnessed the lights going haywire before they went red, against his favour. That's when he ran the light and was hit. I believe that it is White Light's doing, that he manipulated the traffic lights to create the accident as revenge for him installing security measures on your phone."

"But he'll live?"

"Yes, yes, Fimberley will live."

"Good."

I sighed and leaned back in my seat. Jesus. I'd almost gotten a man killed today, and I didn't even know about it.

Just then my phone buzzed. I flicked the screen on and saw a text message waiting for me.

It was from the same unknown number.

Crap it was him. He was listening.

Without warning I stormed out of the room, leaving Martinez and Eddie behind but motioning with a hand that they follow. I passed Brandon on my way out and mouthed to him that I had White Light on the line, motioned for him to spread the message. As he did so, I took my jacket and headed out of the office. I didn't want any more displays of force to hurt anyone in there.

Out on the street, I replied to the message.

"You son of a bitch."

'I did what I had to. He thought he was smarter than me. I proved him wrong.'

With our tech out of commission, I didn't know what to do. I didn't even know if the tracing software installed on my phone would work automatically, but I decided to take the risk. I reverted back to the stuff Brandon had told me about hostage negotiation; if you had a suspect or a confirmed perp on the phone and you needed a trace or time to prepare, keep them talking, appeal to them, distract them from what you were doing. I barely noticed Brandon approaching me as I typed in a response.

"You put a man in the hospital!"

'He deserved it! No one's smarter than me.'

I stopped and thought. If I had to keep him talking, I had to talk about him. Just like Brandon taught me.

"Yeah, no one. I've been supremely interested in what you've been doing, mister White Light. Its the reason why I haven't given this case to anyone else yet."

'Oh, now you're interested in me? I thought you were all business, all about catching me and putting me where I belong, hmm?'

"Oh that's still there, trust me, but I want to know more about you. What do you do with these...things you create on your computer?"

He took a while to answer, but he did.

'I sell them online. What I create aren't full programs, but templates. Skeletons that require meat and muscles and organs to function fully. What I sell aren't full products, but fully customisable templates, catered for the buyer by the buyer. I can give them a fully functioning program, or give them something more barebones for them to work on themselves. It's the essence of my work, and what makes my work so popular. Of course, the way I do it is quite advanced, something that someone like you wouldn't be able to understand.'

"And who do you sell these programs to?"

I motioned to Brandon, mouthing to him about the status of a trace, if there was any. He typed something out on his phone and showed it to me.

"Trace working. Few more seconds to pin location."

I didn't acknowledge him, instead focusing on the conversation. He'd sent me another message while I was distracted.

'Anyone, really. Mostly programming students online that have problems writing their own code for their classes. They don't pay me much, but they appreciate my work. The ones that do pay are the companies, big technology corporations that need that fresh spark, something to revitalise their business. I name a price, we haggle for a bit, then they pay me and I give them a skeleton of a program for them to meddle with. Its honest business.'

"Yeah, but you've also been breaking into secure government systems, what's the deal with that then?"

'It's just to get some framework for my programs! Nothing more, I swear!'

Brandon told me that the trace was almost complete.

"And are you gonna tell that to the district judge?"

He didn't reply. I waited. Brandon gave the trace a few more seconds. Then I saw a reply, felt my phone buzz again in my hand.

'Why are you running a trace on me?'

Uh oh.

"Brandon please tell me the trace is done."

"It's done, units are on their way now."

'There's a trace being run on me. Do you know anything about it?'

"No."

'You're lying.'

I suddenly saw a pop-up in the corner of my screen. He was accessing something! I scrambled to my phone's home screen and hit the countermeasure app Fimberley had given me. Instantly I saw a road map of various services and systems in my area. A red line connected a point in the distance to somewhere immediately near me. I checked what it was connected to.

A gas main. He was overloading the pressure limiting system in that one valve.

Crap.

I tapped on the connection to sever it, and I saw the red line get cut in two and disappear.

"Brandon, I need you to take me to his location."

"You sure?"

"Now!"

He nodded and ran off, presumably to get a vehicle. I returned my attention to my phone. He was overloading another main nearby. I tapped it and the connection disappeared. Another connection appeared, this one connected to a water main, one of the nearby hydrants. I closed it but another one immediately popped up, and as I closed that one two more popped up to replace it. By the time Brandon had his car ready and idling beside me I had several connections to sever in the span of seconds. Without thinking I fumbled my way to the car, unable to take my eyes off my phone for even a second. Brandon helped me in and we drove off. He knew or destination, I let him drive.

I swept my fingers on my screen and zoomed out the map. All the connections became less visible, but I had him within my map's range. I closed all the existing connections and then put down one of my own, an attack to the power supply to his apartment block. He took several seconds before closing it, and I opened another attack, trying to overload the gas line that ran through his unit. He closed that one and sent several attacks to the surrounding systems around me, traffic lights, gas mains, water pipes, everything, in an attempt to slow us down. I tried to close as much as I could but some attacks got through. The lights ahead of us suddenly turned red and a hydrant nearby burst its top. Brandon kept on driving.

"Brandon, please tell me our units are at the scene already!"

"I can't drive and bloody talk on the phone, you git! You do it!"

"I'm trying to fend off all this shit that's flying our way, I'm busy!"

"Then don't ask!"

He swerved to avoid a car that came barrelling at us across the intersection and kept going. My hands fell into a routine; defend attacks, send attacks, defend, attack, defend, attack. I was focused on my phone, so much so that I didn't notice that we'd stopped. Brandon hauled me out and stood me on my feet.

"Would you stop bloody looking at that thing and focus! We're here already!"

I looked up at his face, then down at my phone. There weren't any more attacks coming from him. I kept my phone and followed him into the apartment block. This was where he was, we were going to get him.

Upstairs the rest of the team was there. Eddie, Liddell, and team of Swat soldiers, all parked outside a door. They were waiting on us. I fell in behind the team and nodded, while Brandon stood on the stairs, covering the floor below. The team leader gave a silent signal and they breached.

Inside there was a man, seated at a computer, his hands in the air as the police team yelled him down and cuffed him. He looked absolutely ordinary, but as I went past the crowd to his computer I knew that he wasn't. On his monitor were three windows, one with a chat window that I knew was connected to my phone, one with a map that had systems and connections on it, and one with a long string of letters and numbers on it, coding, I guess. White Light was hauled to his feet and taken away, leaving us standing within his inner sanctum. I looked to Brandon.

"So, what now?"

"We fry the bastard, that's what."