Freedom TM

Aaron when he grows up.”
    Ross was standing now looking at the four of them, aiming his HUD glasses. Sebeck remembered that most HUD glasses had built-in cameras. It was the source of all the many millions of photos and videos people were uploading to the darknet—the eyes of this distributed society.
    “Smile.…”
    Everyone smiled.
    Ross then slid the virtual photo across D-Space over to the parents, and then he slid a copy over to Sebeck as well.
    The parents were cooing as they collected their son. “That looks great. Thank you so much, Rakh. Detective Sebeck. The very best of luck on your quest—for all our sakes.”
    The parents started moving off, the father holding his son in his arms.
    Ross watched them go. “Let’s talk about this quest of yours.”
    “What about it? The Thread has been leading me in a circle around the town of Greeley for a week now. There’s somethinghere I’m supposed to be doing or getting or understanding—and I’m not.”
    “Do you think the Cloud Gate is here in Greeley?”
    Sebeck shook his head. “The gate is supposed to appear after humanity justifies its freedom to the Daemon—not before.”
    “And Sobol gave you no indication how we were supposed to justify our freedom?”
    “No. He was annoyingly vague.”
    Ross pondered the question. “This Thread has been leading you to
events
—not places? Correct?”
    “Yeah. For the last seven months Price and I have found ourselves at the center of just about every major change now under way. I’ve seen the rise of the new power infrastructure, the new economy, the new fMRI legal system—you name it. That’s how my reputation grew so fast. We just always seemed to be in the right place at the right time.”
    “Well, then we do know one thing.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Something big is about to happen in Greeley.”

Chapter 28: // Sky Ranch
    Natalie Philips shared the Cessna Citation III business jet with only one other passenger as it flew high above … well, somewhere. The destination was classified. In the absence of reading materials or a laptop, she had difficulty keeping her thoughts from wandering. She wasn’t even permitted a pad of paper or a pen. So instead she used her prodigious memory to recall her exploit code line by line—searching for flaws.
    The interior of the plane was roomy and reasonably comfortable, but there was no easy way for her not to be in view of the other passenger. He was a disheveled man in his sixties with unruly gray hair, a sizable belly, a cheap suit, and a wide, striped tie in a careless knot. He smelled of alcohol from the moment he got on the plane. He was staring into space—or so Philips had thought.
    “You mind if we turn that on?”
    Philips looked up at him and then toward the front of the cabin where a flat-panel television screen was set into the bulkhead. “I don’t think we can get television. It’s probably for video.”
    The man sighed and got to his feet, grabbing a remote from a low table. “I saw the HD satellite antenna on the fuselage. They always want to know what the media is saying. If we’re gonna be here for a while …”
    He clicked the television on, and it was already set to a news channel. On-screen newscaster Anji Anderson was talking, whilebehind her video played of masked gunmen looting a shop in a town somewhere in Kansas. The Chiron read, “Illegals on a Rampage.”
    Anderson’s voice came through clearly even over the jet engine noise, “… another night of violence. Armed gangs of men—believed to be undocumented laborers and drug dealers. Local residents have taken up arms in defense of their property, but the problem seems to be growing ever worse as the economy continues to crumble.”
    The guy sighed, nodding to himself. “You gotta hand it to ’em.” He looked at his watch then continued clicking through the channels….
    News followed by news, and all of it showing mayhem in the streets of middle America. One of the graphics bore the title “Rape Counseling Center” in bold letters, followed by addresses and phone numbers in several states. He kept clicking—cartoons, a shopping channel, and more disturbing newscasts.
    “Can we just watch one thing, please?”
    “So, why’d they call you down?”
    Philips turned to him. “I don’t discuss my work.”
    He smirked. “I used to be like that.”
    “Well, I’m still like that.”
    He muted the television as burning houses filled the screen, and put the remote