"Hang on." I think fast. "This isn't a normal MoD property, is it? It'll have been shuffled under the rug back in 1946 as part of the postwar settlement. We'd really have to ask the Audit Department about who owns it, but I'm pretty sure it's not owned by any NHS Trust, and they won't simply give it back-" My brain finally catches up with my mouth. "What weekend seminar?"

"Oh bugger," says a new voice from the doorway, a rich baritone with a hint of a Scouse accent. "He's not from the Board."

"What did I tell you?" Godel screeches. "It's a conspiracy! He's from Human Resources! They sent him to evaluate us!"

I am quickly getting a headache. "Let me get this straight. Mandelbrot, you checked in thirty years ago for a weekend seminar, and they put you in the secure ward? Godel, I'm not from HR; I'm from Ops. You must be Cantor, right? Angleton sends his regards."

That gets his attention. "Angleton? The skinny whippersnapper's still warming a chair, is he?" Godel looks delighted. "Excellent!" gets his attention. "Angleton? The skinny whippersnapper's still warming a chair, is he?" Godel looks delighted. "Excellent!"

"He's my boss. And I want to know the rules of that game you were just playing with Turing."

Three pairs of eyes swivel to point at me-four, for they are joined by the last inmate, standing in the doorway-and suddenly I feel very small and very vulnerable.

"He's sharp," says Mandelbrot. "Too bad."

"How do we know he's telling the truth?" Godel's screech is uncharacteristically muted. "He could be from the Opposition! KGB, Department 16! Or GRU, maybe."

"The Soviet Union collapsed a few decades ago," volunteers Turing. "It said so in the Telegraph Telegraph."

"Black Chamber, then." Godel sounds unconvinced.

"What do you think the rules are?" asks Cantor, a drily amused expression stretching the wrinkles around his eyes.

"You've got pencils." I can see one from here, sitting on the sideboard on top of a newspaper folded at the crossword page. "And, uh . . ." What must the world look like from an inmate's point of view? What must the world look like from an inmate's point of view? "Oh. I get it." "Oh. I get it."

(The realization is blinding, sudden, and makes me feel like a complete idiot.) "The hospital! There's no electricity, no electronics-no way to get a signal out-but it works both ways! You're inside the biggest damn grounded defensive pentacle this side of HQ , and anything on the outside trying to get in has got to get past the defenses." Because that's what the Sisters are really about: not nurses but perimeter guards. "You're a theoretical research cell, aren't you?"

"We prefer to call ourselves a think tank." Cantor nods gravely.

"Or even"-Mandelbrot takes a deep breath-"a brains trust!"

"A-ha! AhaHAHAHA! Hic." Godel covers his mouth, face reddening.

"What do you think the rules are?" Cantor repeats, and they're still staring at me, as if, as if . . .

"Why does it matter?" I ask. I'm thinking that it could be anything; a 2,5 universal Turing machine encoded in the moves of the pawns-that would fit-whatever it is, it's symbolic communication, very abstract, very pared-back, and if they're doing it in this ultimately firewalled environment and expecting to report directly to the Board, it's got to be way above my security clearance- "Because you're acting cagey, lad. Which makes you too bright for your own good. Listen to me: just try to convince yourself that we're playing chess, and Matron will let you out of here."

"What's thinking got to do with-" I stop. It's useless pretending. "Fuck. Okay, you're a research cell working on some ultimate black problem, and you're using the Farm because it's about the most secure environment anyone can imagine, and you're emulating some kind of minimal universal Turing machine using the chessboard. Say, a 2,5 UTM-two registers, five operations-you can encode the registers positionally in the chessboard's two dimensions, and use the moves to simulate any other universal Turing machine, or a transform in an eleven-dimensional manifold like AXIOM REFUGE-"

Godel's waving frantically. "She's coming! She's coming!" I hear doors clanging in the distance.

Shit. "But why are you so afraid of the Nurses?" "But why are you so afraid of the Nurses?"

"Back channels," Cantor says cryptically. "Alan, be a good lad and try to jam the door for a minute, will you? Bob, you are not not cleared for what we're doing here, but you can tell Angleton that our full report to the Board should be ready in another eighteen months." cleared for what we're doing here, but you can tell Angleton that our full report to the Board should be ready in another eighteen months." Wow-and they've been here since before the Laundry computerized its payroll system in the 1970s? Wow-and they've been here since before the Laundry computerized its payroll system in the 1970s? "Are you absolutely sure they're not going to sell St. Hilda's off to build flats for yuppies? Because if so, you could do worse than tell Georg here, it'll calm him down-" "Are you absolutely sure they're not going to sell St. Hilda's off to build flats for yuppies? Because if so, you could do worse than tell Georg here, it'll calm him down-"

"Get me out of here, and I'll make damned sure they don't sell anything off !" I say fervently. "Or rather, I'll tell Angleton. He'll sort things out." When I remind them what's going on here, they'll be no more inclined to sell off St. Hilda's than they would be to privatize an atomic bomb.

Something outside is rumbling and squealing on the metal rails. "You're sure none of you submitted a complaint about staff brutality?"

"Absolutely!" Godel bounces up and down excitedly.

"It must have been someone else." Cantor glances at the doorway. "You'd better run along. It sounds as if Matron is having second thoughts about you."

I'm halfway out of the carnivorous sofa, struggling for balance. "What kind of-"

"Go!"

I stumble out into the corridor. From the far end, near the nursing station, I hear a grinding noise as of steel wheels spinning furiously on rails, and a mechanical voice blatting: "InTRU-der! EsCAPE ATTempt! All patients must go to their go to their go to their bedROOMs IMMediateLY!"

Whoops. I turn and head in the opposite direction, toward the airlock leading up to the viewing gallery. "Open up!" I yell, thumping the outer door, which is securely fastened, "Dr. Renfield! Time's up! I need to go, now!" There's no response. I see the color-coded handles dangling by the door and yank the red one repeatedly. Nothing happens, of course.

I should have smelled a setup from the start. These theoreticians: they're not in here because they're mad; they're in here because it's the only safe place to put people that dangerous. This little weekend seminar of theirs that's going to deliver some kind of uber-report. What's the topic? What's the topic? I look round, hunting for clues. Something to do with applied demonology; what was the state of the art thirty years ago? Forty? Back in the stone age, punched cards and black candles melted onto sheep's skulls because they hadn't figured out how to use integrated circuits . . . What they're doing with AXIOM REFUGE might be obsolete already, or it might be earth-shatteringly important. There's no way to tell . . . yet. I look round, hunting for clues. Something to do with applied demonology; what was the state of the art thirty years ago? Forty? Back in the stone age, punched cards and black candles melted onto sheep's skulls because they hadn't figured out how to use integrated circuits . . . What they're doing with AXIOM REFUGE might be obsolete already, or it might be earth-shatteringly important. There's no way to tell . . . yet.

I start back up the corridor, glancing inside Turing's room. I spot the chessboard. It's off to one side, the door open and its occupant elsewhere-still holding the line against Nurse Crankshaft. I rush inside and close the door. The table is still there, the chessboard set up with that curious endgame. The first thing that leaps out at me is that there are two pawns of each color, plus most of the high-value pieces. The layout doesn't make much sense-why is the white king missing?-and I wish I'd spent more time playing the game, but . . . On impulse, I reach out and touch the black pawn that's parked in front of the king.

There's an odd kind of electrical tingle you get when you make contact with certain types of summoning grid. I get a powerful jolt of it right now, sizzling up my arm and locking my fingers in place around the head of the chess piece. I try to pull it away from the board, but it's no good: it only wants to move up or down, left or right . . . Left or right? Left or right? I blink. It's a state machine all right: one that's locked by the law of sympathy to some other finite state automaton, one that grinds down slow and hard. I blink. It's a state machine all right: one that's locked by the law of sympathy to some other finite state automaton, one that grinds down slow and hard.

I move the piece forward one square. It's surprisingly heavy, the magnet a solid weight in its base-but more than magnetism holds it in contact with the board. As soon as I stop moving I feel a sharp sting in my fingertips. "Ouch!" I raise them to my mouth just as there's a crash from outside. "InMATE! InMATE!" I begin to turn as a shadow falls across the board.

"Bad patient!" It buzzes. "Bad PATients will be inCAR-cerAT-ED! COME with ME!"

I recoil from the stellate snout and beady lenses. The mechanical nurse reaches out with arms that end in metal pincers instead of hands. I sidestep around the table and reach down to the chessboard for one of the pieces, grasping at random. My hand closes around the white queen, fingers snapping painfully shut on contact, and I shove it hard, following the path of least resistance to an empty cell in the grid between the pawn I just moved and the black king.

Nurse Crankshaft spins round on her base so fast that her cap flies off (revealing a brushed-aluminum hemisphere beneath), emits a deafening squeal of feedbacklike white noise, then says, "Integer overflow?" in a surprised baritone.

"Back off right now or I castle," I warn her, my aching fingertips hovering over the nearest rook.

"Integer overflow. Integer overflow? Divide by zero." Clunk. Clunk. The Sister shivers as a relay inside its torso clicks open, resetting it. Then: "Matron WILL see you NOW!" The Sister shivers as a relay inside its torso clicks open, resetting it. Then: "Matron WILL see you NOW!"

I grab the chess piece, but Nurse Crankshaft lunges in the blink of an eye and has my wrist in a viselike grip. It tugs, sending a burning pain through my carpal-tunnel-stressed wrist. I can't let go of the chess piece: as my hand comes up, the chessboard comes with it as a rigid unit, all the pieces hanging in place. A monstrous buzzing fills my ears, and I smell ozone as the world goes dark-

-And the chittering, buzzing cacophony of voices in my head subsides as I realize-I? Yes, I'm back, I'm me, what the hell just happened?-I'm kneeling on a hard surface, bowed over so my head is between my knees. My right hand-something's wrong with it. My fingers don't want to open. They're cold as ice, painful and prickly with impending cramp. I try to open my eyes. "Urk," I say, for no good reason. I hope I'm not about to throw up.

Sssss . . .

My back doesn't want to straighten up properly, but the floor under my nose is cold and stony and smells damp. I try opening my eyes. It's dark and cool, and a chilly blue light flickers off the dusty flagstones in front of me. I'm in a cellar? I'm in a cellar? I push myself up laboriously with my left hand, looking around for whatever's hissing at me. I push myself up laboriously with my left hand, looking around for whatever's hissing at me.

"BAD Patient! Ssssss! Ssssss!" The voice behind my back doesn't belong to anything human. I scramble around on hands and knees, hampered by the chessboard glued to my frozen right hand.

I'm in Matron's lair.

Matron lives in a cavelike basement room, its low ceiling supported by whitewashed brick and floored in what look to be the original Victorian-era stone slabs. The windows are blocked by columns of bricks, rotting mortar crumbling between them. Steel rails run around the room, and riding them, three Sisters glide back and forth between me and the open door. Their optics flicker with amethyst malice. Off to one side, a wall of pale blue cabinets lines one entire wall: the front panel (covered in impressive-looking dials and switches) leaves me in no doubt as to what it is. A thick braid of cables runs from one open cabinet (in whose depths a patchboard is just visible) across a row of wooden trestles to the middle of the floor, where they split into thick bundles and dangle to the five principal corners of the live summoning grid that is responsible for the beautiful cobalt blue glow of Cerenkov radiation-and tells me I'm in deep trouble.

"Integer overflow," intones one of the Sisters. Her claws go snicker-snack, the surgical steel gleaming in the dim light.

Here's the point: Matron isn't just a 1960s mainframe: we can't work miracles, and artificial intelligence is still still fifty years in the future. However, we fifty years in the future. However, we can can bind an extradimensional entity and compel it to serve, and even communicate with it by using a 1960s mainframe as a front-end processor. Which is all very well, especially if it's in a secure air-gapped installation with no way of getting out. But what if some double-domed theoreticians who are working on a calculus of contagion using AXIOM REFUGE accidentally talk in front of one of its peripheral units about a way of sending a message? What if a side effect of their research has accidentally opened a chink in the firewall? They're not going to exploit it . . . but they're not the only long-term inmates, are they? In fact, if I was really paranoid, I might even imagine they'd put Matron up to mischief in order to make the point that closing the Farm is a really bad idea. bind an extradimensional entity and compel it to serve, and even communicate with it by using a 1960s mainframe as a front-end processor. Which is all very well, especially if it's in a secure air-gapped installation with no way of getting out. But what if some double-domed theoreticians who are working on a calculus of contagion using AXIOM REFUGE accidentally talk in front of one of its peripheral units about a way of sending a message? What if a side effect of their research has accidentally opened a chink in the firewall? They're not going to exploit it . . . but they're not the only long-term inmates, are they? In fact, if I was really paranoid, I might even imagine they'd put Matron up to mischief in order to make the point that closing the Farm is a really bad idea.

"I'm not a patient," I tell the Sisters. "You are not in receipt of a valid Section two, three, four, or 136 order subject to the Mental Health Act, and you're bloody well not getting a 5(2) or 5(4) out of me either."

I'm nauseous and sweating bullets, but there is this about being trapped in a dungeon by a constrained class-four manifestation: whether or not you call them demons, they play by the rules. As long as Matron hasn't managed to get me sectioned, I'm not a patient, and therefore she has no authority to detain me. I hope.

"Doc-TOR HexenHAMMer has been SUM-moned," grates the middle Sister. "When he RE-turns to sign the PA-pers Doc-TOR RenFIELD has prePARED, we will HAVE YOU."

A repetitive squeaking noise draws close. A fourth Sister glides through the track in the doorway, pushing a trolley. A white starched-cotton cloth supports a row of gleaming ice-pick-shaped instruments. The chorus row of Sisters blocks the exit as effectively as a column of riot police. They glide back and forth like a rank of Space Invaders.

"I do not consent to treatment," I tell the middle Sister. I'm betting that she's the one the nameless horror in the summoning grid is talking through, using the ancient mainframe as an i/o channel. "You can't make me consent. And lobotomy requires the patient's consent, in this country. So why bother?"

"You WILL con-SENT."

The buzzing voice doesn't come from the robo-nurses, or the hypertrophied pocket calculator on the opposite wall. The summoning grid flickers: deep inside it, shadowy and translucent, the bound and summoned demon squats and grins at me with things that aren't eyes set close above something that isn't a mouth.

"You MUST con-SENT. I WILL be free."

I try to let go of the chess piece, but my fingers are clamped around it so tightly I'm beginning to lose sensation. Pins and needles tingle up my wrist, halfway to the elbow. "Let me guess," I manage to say. "You sent the complaint. Right?"

"The SEC-ure ward in-MATES are under my CARE. I am RE-quired to CARE for them. The short-stay in-MATES are use-LESS. YOU will be use-FUL."

I see it now: why Matron smuggled out the message that prompted Andy to send me. And it's an oh-shit oh-shit moment. moment. Of course Of course the enchained entity who provides Matron with her back-end intelligence wants to be free: but it's not just about going home to Hilbert-space hell or wherever it comes from. She wants to be free to go walkabout in our world, and for that she needs someone to set up a bridge from the grid to an appropriate host. (Of which there is a plentiful supply, just upstairs from here.) "Enjoying the carnal pleasures of the flesh," they used to call it; there's a reason most cultures have a down on the idea of demonic possession. She needs a brain that's undamaged by K. Syndrome, but not too powerful (Cantor and friends would be impossible to control), nor one of the bodies whose absence would alert us that the Farm was out of control (so neither Renfield nor Hexenhammer is suitable). the enchained entity who provides Matron with her back-end intelligence wants to be free: but it's not just about going home to Hilbert-space hell or wherever it comes from. She wants to be free to go walkabout in our world, and for that she needs someone to set up a bridge from the grid to an appropriate host. (Of which there is a plentiful supply, just upstairs from here.) "Enjoying the carnal pleasures of the flesh," they used to call it; there's a reason most cultures have a down on the idea of demonic possession. She needs a brain that's undamaged by K. Syndrome, but not too powerful (Cantor and friends would be impossible to control), nor one of the bodies whose absence would alert us that the Farm was out of control (so neither Renfield nor Hexenhammer is suitable).

"Renfield," I say. "You got her, didn't you?" I'm on my feet now, crouched but balancing on two points, not three. "Managed to slip a geas on her, but she can't release you herself. Hexenhammer, too?"

"Cle-VER." Matron gloats at me from inside her summoning grid. "Hex-EN-heimer first. Soon, you TOO."

"Why me?" I demand, backing away from the doorway and the walls-the Sister's track runs right round the room, following the walls-skirting the summoning grid warily. "What do you want?"

"Acc-CESS to the LAUNDRY!" buzzes the summoning grid's demonic inmate. "We wants re-VENGE! Freedom!" In other words, it wants the same old same old. These creatures are so so predictable, just like most predators. It's just a shame I'm between it and what it evidently wants. predictable, just like most predators. It's just a shame I'm between it and what it evidently wants.

Two of the Sisters begin to glide menacingly toward me: one drifts toward the mainframe console, but the fourth stays stubbornly in front of the door. "Come on, we can talk," I offer, tongue stumbling in my too-dry mouth. "Can't we work something out?"

I don't really believe that the trapped extradimensional abomination wants anything I'd willingly give it, but I'm running low on options, and anything that buys time for me to think is valuable.

"Free-DOM!" The two moving Sisters commence a flanking movement. I try to let go of the chessboard and dodge past the summoning grid, but I slip-and as I stumble I shove the chessboard hard. The piece I'm holding clicks sideways like a car's gearshift, and locks into place. "DIVIDE BY ZERO!" shriek the Sisterhood, grinding to a halt.

I stagger a drunken two-step around Matron, who snarls at me and throws a punch. The wall of the grid absorbs her claws with a snap and crackle of blue lightning, and I flinch. Behind me, a series of clicks warn me that the Sisters are resetting: any second now they'll come back online and grab me. But for the moment, my fingers aren't stuck to the board.

"Come to MEEE!" the thing in the grid howls, as the first of her robot minions' eyes light up with amber malice, and the wheels begin to turn. "I can give you Free-DOM!"

"Fuck off." That wiring loom in the open cabinet is only four meters away. Within its open doors I see more than just an i/o interface: in the bottom of the rack there's a bunch of stuff that looks like a tea-stained circuit diagram I was reading the other day- Why exactly exactly did Angleton point me at the power-supply requirements? Could it possibly be because he suspected Matron was off her trolley, and I might have to switch her off? did Angleton point me at the power-supply requirements? Could it possibly be because he suspected Matron was off her trolley, and I might have to switch her off?

"Con-SENT is IRREL-e-VANT! PRE-pare to be loboto-MIZED-"

Talk about design kluges-they stuck the i/o controller in the top of the power-supply rack! The chessboard is free in my left hand, pieces still stuck to it. And now I know what to do. I take hold of one of the rooks, and wiggle until I feel it begin to slide into a permitted move. Because, after all, there are only a few states that this automaton can occupy, and if I can crash the Sisters for just a few seconds while I get to the power supply- The Sisters begin to roll around the edge of the room, trying to get between me and the row of cabinets. I wiggle my hand, and there's a taste of violets and a loud rattle of solenoids tripping. The nearest Sister's motors crank up to a tooth-grinding whine, and she lunges past me, rolling into her colleagues with a tooth-jarring crash.

I jump forward, dropping the chessboard, and reach for the master-circuit-breaker handle. I twist it just as a screech of feedback behind me announces the Matron-monster's fury. "I'M FREE!" it shrieks, just as I twist the handle hard in the opposite direction. Then the lights dim, there's a bright blue flash from the summoning grid, and a bang so loud it rattles my brains in my head.

For a few seconds I stand stupidly, listening to the tooth-chattering clatter of overloaded relays. My vision dims as ozone tickles my nostrils: I can see smoke. I've got to get out of here, I've got to get out of here, I realize. I realize. Something's burning. Something's burning. Not surprising, really. Mainframe power supplies- especially ones that have been running steady for nearly forty years-don't take kindly to being hard power-cycled, and the 1602 was one of the last computers built to run on tubes: I've probably blown half its circuit boards. I glance around, but aside from one of the sisters (lying on her side, narrow-gauge wheels spinning mania cally) I'm the only thing moving. Summoning grids don't generally survive being power-cycled either, especially if the thing they were set to contain, like an electric fence, is halfway across them when the power comes back on. I warily bypass the blue, crackling pentacle as I make my way toward the corridor outside. Not surprising, really. Mainframe power supplies- especially ones that have been running steady for nearly forty years-don't take kindly to being hard power-cycled, and the 1602 was one of the last computers built to run on tubes: I've probably blown half its circuit boards. I glance around, but aside from one of the sisters (lying on her side, narrow-gauge wheels spinning mania cally) I'm the only thing moving. Summoning grids don't generally survive being power-cycled either, especially if the thing they were set to contain, like an electric fence, is halfway across them when the power comes back on. I warily bypass the blue, crackling pentacle as I make my way toward the corridor outside.

I think when I get home, I'm going to write a report urgently advising HR to send some human nurses for a change-and to reassure Cantor and his colleagues that they're not about to sell off the roof over their heads just because they happen to have finished their research project. Then I'm going to get very drunk and take a long weekend off work. And maybe when I go back, I'll challenge Angleton to a game of chess.

I don't expect to win, but it'll be very interesting to see what rules he plays by.

Afterword-"Down on the Farm"Astute readers may have recognized this as a story about Bob Howard, the put-upon protagonist of my books The Atrocity Archives The Atrocity Archives and and The Jennifer Morgue The Jennifer Morgue, and a variety of other shorter works (including the Hugo-winning novella "The Concrete Jungle").

Unwirer

[with Cory Doctorow]

The cops caught Roscoe as he was tightening the butterfly bolts on the dish antenna he'd pitoned into the rock face opposite the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. They were state troopers, not Fed radio cops, and they pulled their cruiser onto the soft shoulder of the freeway, braking a few feet short of the soles of his boots. It took Roscoe a moment to tighten the bolts down properly before he could let go of the dish and roll over to face the cops, but he knew from the crunch of their boots on the road salt and the creak of their cold holsters that they were the law.

"Be right with you, Officers," he hollered into the gale-force winds that whipped along the rock face. The antenna was made from a surplus pizza-dish satellite rig, a polished tomato-soup can, and a length of coax that descended to a pigtail with the right fitting for a wireless card. All perfectly legal, mostly.

He tightened the last of the bolts, squirted them with Loctite, and slid back on his belly, off the insulated Therm-a-Rest he'd laid between his chest and the frozen ground. The cops' heads were wreathed in the steam of their exhalations, and one of them was nervously flicking his-no, her her-handcuffs around on her belt.

"Everything all right, sir?" the other one said, in a flat upstate New York accent. A townie. He stretched his gloved hand out and pulled Roscoe to his feet.

"Yeah, just fine," he said. "I like to watch winter birds on the river. Forgot my binox today, but I still got some good sightings."

"Winter birds, huh?" The cop was giving him a bemused look.

"Winter birds."

The cop leaned over the railing and took a long look down. "Huh. Better you shouldn't do it by the roadside, sir," he said. "Never know when someone's going to skid out and drive off onto the shoulder-you could be crushed." He waved at his partner, who gave them a hard look and retreated into the steamy warmth of the cruiser. "All right, then," he said. "When does your node go up?"

Roscoe smiled and dared a wink. "I'll be finished aligning the dish in about an hour. I've got line of sight from here to a repeater on a support on the Rainbow Bridge, and from there down the Rainbow Street corridor. Some good tall buildings there, line of sight to most of downtown, at least when the trees are bare. Leaves and wireless don't mix."

"My place is Fourth and Walnut. Think you'll get there?" Roscoe relaxed imperceptibly, certain now that this wasn't a bust.

"Hope so. Sooner rather than later."

"That'd be great. My kids are e-mailing me out of house and home." The cop looked uncomfortable and cleared his throat. "Still, you might want to finish this one then go home and stay there for a while. DA's Office, they've got some kind of hotshot from the FCC in town preaching the gospel and, uh, getting heavy on bird-watchers. That sort of thing."

Roscoe sucked in his lower lip. "I may do just that," he conceded. "And thank you for the warning."

The cop waved as he turned away. "My pleasure, sir."

Roscoe drove home slowly, and not just because of the snow and compacted slush on the roads. A hotshot from the FCC A hotshot from the FCC sounded like the inquisition come to town. Roscoe's lifelong mistrust of radio cops had metastasized into surging hatred three years ago, when they busted him behind a Federal telecoms rap. sounded like the inquisition come to town. Roscoe's lifelong mistrust of radio cops had metastasized into surging hatred three years ago, when they busted him behind a Federal telecoms rap.

He'd lost his job and spent the best part of six months inside, though he'd originally been looking at a five-year contributory-infringement stretch-compounded to twenty by the crypto running on the access point under the "use a cypher, go to jail" statute-to second-degree tariff evasion. His public defender had been worse than useless, but the ACLU had filed an amicus on his behalf, which led the judge to knock the beef down to criminal trespass and unlawful emission, six months and two years' probation, two years in which he wasn't allowed to program a goddamn microwave oven, let alone admin the networks that had been his trade. Prison hadn't been as bad for him as it could have been-unwirers got respect-but, while he was inside, Janice filed for divorce, and by the time he got out, he'd lost everything he'd spent the last decade building-his marriage, his house, his savings, his career. Everything except for the unwiring.

It was this experience that had turned him from a freewheeling geek into what FCC Chairman Valenti called "one of the copyright crooks whose illegal pirate networks provide safe havens to terrorists within the homeland and abroad." And so it was with a shudder and a glance over his shoulder that he climbed the front steps and put his key in the lock of the house he and Marcel rented.