Watch Dogs by John Shirley Page A

for mutual support. They’d talked about a lot of things, but since they were both sworn to secrecy about their work, they almost never spoke about it—and when they did they never broke the rules of classification.
    One evening, as they ate in the cafeteria, Ruth had been unusually quiet. She kept glancing fretfully at her cell phone.
    “Something wrong?” Seline had asked her, at last.
    “Um...you have that app on your phone where stuff can be transferred to it just by touching it with another phone, if...”
    “I do have that. Almost never get to use it.”
    “’Kay. Is it alright if I test mine, transfer a jpeg to yours, maybe a couple of them?”
    “Sure!”
    They set it up and the two women touched their phones together. Then Ruth signaled her to wait—and she sent Seline a text.
    The text said, Pretend to look at a jpeg. Don’t look at file. Just keep for me.
    Seline nodded. She clicked on a photo she’d taken herself, off the fantail of the ship, pretended to study it, and smiled. “Nice!”
     Soon after, Ruth smiled nervously at her, got up, and took her tray to clean it off...
    And that was the last time Seline ever saw her.
    Ruth disappeared from the ship the same night, somewhere off the coast of Yemen.
    “Taxi, lady?”
     Seline was jarred from her thoughts, and looked at the taxi driver, a smiling older black man.
     “Sure. Michigan Shore Hotel.”
    “I know the place. Let me take that duffel for you...”
    “It’s okay. I’ll take it in back with me...”
    She wasn’t letting that bag out of her hands. In it, along with her uniform and passport and souvenirs and discharge papers, was a flashdrive.
     And on the flashdrive was something that Ruth Medina had died for.
    Seline was going to make sure Ruth hadn’t died in vain.
    #
    Mick Wolfe sat down on the sofa in the safehouse, and unwrapped the package.
    Inside the package was a black smartphone. One of the slightly larger types. It didn’t seem unusual...
    He looked for a note in the package, found nothing except a charger and an extra battery extension. No, there was one other thing. It looked like a small hearing aid. He realized it was some kind of Bluetooth device, so he could listen to the phone without seeming to, when he wanted.
    He switched the phone on and waited. It booted up quickly, and almost immediately a message appeared, text within a jpeg frame:
    W: Touch on the icon in the corner. And learn...
    There’s a program that will only exist on a temporary basis and that will teach you how to use this device.
    I’m probably crazy to create another one with access to the new ctOS, and crazier to give it to you. Maybe this knock on the head has made me even crazier but you may as well take advantage of it. I still have some symptoms of a concussion, so I still have to stay off the streets to avoid getting worse. So here’s a way you can bust a move for me. And for you. You and I knew each other back when. Your father helped me, so...I’m helping you, with this. And maybe we’ll help each other...
    P.
    Wolfe’s fingers trembled as he tapped the screen icon. The program came up with animated imagery showing the methodology for using what Wolfe thought of as the PearcePhone.
    He read the directions excitedly, and then with increasing skepticism. For one thing, Pearce claimed the phone’s transmissions were totally untraceable; no one could listen in on it, or trace back its calls. Wolfe doubted that was totally possible.
    But this other stuff...taking control of traffic lights? Remotely shorting out power boxes? Controlling trains?
    This phone couldn’t possibly do all that...
    Could it?
    There was only one way to find out.
    #
    Southside Chicago, east 45 th . Sleet was slanting through the dusk.
    Wolfe had put a heavy dark blue hoodie on; he had the hood up, but his face was exposed. He hoped the improved facial scrambling app actually worked. The black market app transmitted a signal from the PearcePhone to nearby ctOS