Daemon

tower had several temperature-controlled subbasements linked directly into the fiber optic network running beneath the streets of downtown Chicago. From the subbasement the IT department’s tendrils spread to every corner of the building, snaking up all fifty floors through trunk lines that fanned out on each floor to tap every employee individually.
    As Vanowen took the separate bank of elevators leading into the basement, he realized how like the
Sacculina
parasite the IT department was. And lately it had been growing. Without authorization.
    Lindhurst said he’d taken care of this
.
    Months ago, Lindhurst had moved from his corner office on the forty-ninth floor into the windowless bowels of the building. It was an unprecedented gesture of hands-on management. To Vanowen’s delight, Lindhurst presided over a two-month bloodbath of IT layoffs. Purging the department of‘questionable individuals,’ cleansing the global organization, and hiring new people who had no doubt where their loyalties should lie. And Leland Equity not only remained, it thrived like never before. The would-be Daemon was stopped – Lindhurst had succeeded, and not a word about their little ‘difficulty’ had made it into the press. The problem was gone.
    But now something frightening was happening. The accounting system was wrong. They were a private equity house, for chrissakes. They had to know how to add and subtract numbers.
    Vanowen was starting to wonder whether Lindhurst had manufactured this whole threat. Was he that ambitious? Was he that clever?
    No way
.
    Lindhurst certainly had his little fiefdom locked down tight now. Even Vanowen had to order lobby security to enter a code into the keypad in the elevators to get them to move down into the subbasement. The place was like a missile silo. Perhaps Lindhurst was getting too distant from upper management. Perhaps it was time to pull him back into the executive suite. Or to fire him. Vanowen pondered this as the elevator doors opened onto a long, featureless white hallway on level B-2. Uncharacteristically, the hall ran straight ahead, no right or left. Vanowen had never been down here. The corridor stretched for what looked like a hundred feet or more. It had the plastic smell of new construction. Not a sign, a receptionist desk, or anything. He hesitated a moment.
    But Vanowen still felt a bit of anger, so he strode out and down the hall, his expensive shoes clacking on the black tile floor.
    What the hell kind of place is this
?
    He tried to recall any descriptions of the IT department by other executives, but came up empty. He kept clicking down the interminable hallway. There were no doors. He squinted ahead, but the hallway somehow seemed to disappear in adim blackness. Surely he should be able to see the end of it.
    He glanced back at the elevator door. It was nearly a hundred feet back. Could they have mistakenly sent him to the storage floor?
    He turned front again and peered into the distance. Damnedest thing.
    Then something impossible happened. A female voice spoke to him from the air six inches in front of his face. ‘
Why have you come here?
’
    Vanowen jumped back three feet and nearly fell on his ass. His gasp echoed down the hallway in both directions. He took a moment to catch his breath. He held his chest, still gasping for air. Was he having a coronary?
    The voice spoke again, from that spot in midair. ‘
You were commanded to stay out of this place
.’
    It was like a ghost. But it was a computer voice, wasn’t it? He could just get a hint of artificiality in it. British. Leland had a sophisticated voice response system on their customer service phone lines. Lindhurst had demonstrated it to the board last year. It reduced call center costs by 90 percent – it was cheaper than India. But it didn’t speak in midair.
    This was just a trick.
    Vanowen was getting his wits back. And his anger. This prank was way out of line. ‘Lindhurst! Get me Lindhurst, goddamnit!’ Vanowen’s voice echoed. ‘I will not be treated this way!’
    ‘QUIET!’
The word was so loud it ripped the fabric of the air around him. It was a physical presence that bowled him over and sent him sprawling backward, where he lay in the hallway, dazed. His ears were ringing. His eyes watering. It was possibly the loudest sound he’d ever experienced.
    He felt a trickle running from his right nostril, and he dabbed a hand up – coming back with blood. ‘Jesus …’ He pulled a silk