Page 9 of Stone Sentinel

ELEVEN

By late afternoon, Octavia calculated she was halfway there. Sure, she could work normal IT support, but it was so much more lucrative when you were fixing problems for people whose businesses were...of questionable legality. It was one thing to fix an ordinary family's printer so their kid could print out an assignment for school, but when a dude who sold fake identification documents downloaded an update that made his computer stop talking to his printer...the support tech who could fix the problem gained superhero status. And a five star review, for service and discretion. Which only earned her even more of a reputation with clients just like him.

So when she needed some ready cash...

Today, she'd fitted a new electronic security system to a motorcycle club's clubhouse, turning the fortress high tech. Admittedly, she'd used a drill more than she'd used her laptop, to fit the electronic locks to all the doors, but even she was impressed by the end of it. And the motorcycle club president was, too, which was why she'd had such a good day.

She'd also done a couple of ordinary tech support call outs, sorting bog-standard computer issues for several cryptocurrency traders. Those she'd been able to do remotely, with a voice synthesiser, which was usually a good thing when dealing with those guys. If they'd known she was a woman...which was why her profile picture was a caricature of a male vampire holding a camera with OTTO emblazoned on a black ribbon underneath. She even gave a discount to anyone who understood the Discworld reference, but she'd only encountered one client who did – a female cryptocurrency trader, as it happened.

She rose from her seat and stretched. She could wait until she had enough for an entire new computer, but she'd learned that the best graphics cards often had to be ordered in, and took longer to arrive than anything else. She had almost enough for the graphics card, so she should probably order that first and leave the rest for the moment.

A quick check of her usual suppliers told her they had no high end graphics cards in stock in right now, no matter which brand she wanted, so she'd be better off calling around tomorrow to see who was expecting an order soonest.

In the meantime, her only other option was the media labs at the university, which she was allowed to access for free while she was still enrolled as a student. They didn't have the best equipment, but it was still better than anything else she'd be able to access for a few weeks. Hopefully, it would be enough to recreate the pilot so she could still apply for the grant...

TWELVE

The mid semester break had started, so the university was almost deserted. It was weird seeing the place so empty in daylight.

The media labs were the exception, though – the place was like a frat house, with boys and their drinks draped across every surface...and every computer.

One of them, a guy who was working on his laptop instead of the dark monitor in front of him, moved aside to let her take his spot. She thanked him and logged on.

For the first time ever, she was glad she used cloud-based software, because the university wasn't silly enough to grant its IT students admin privileges on these machines.

But as she clicked on the file she'd last been working on, all she got was errors. The source files on her old computer were inaccessible, and it would take her hours to swap the links for the backups in the cloud. Then again, it wasn't like she had anything else to do...

Her fingers danced across the keys, replacing link after link. It didn't take long for it to become boring, or for her thoughts to drift away from her task to the conversation going on behind her.

"It has to open with a rap, about how everyone deserted him, but he went it alone anyway."

"I know! We should usePirates of Penzance. Play on that, somehow. Everyone likes that one."

"Can we do that? Isn't that, like, plagiarism and shit?"

"Hamiltondid it."

"Really?"

"Yep."

Silence reigned for a moment.

Then they all fell over each other to agree that they should absolutely do that, because it had been done inHamilton, which sounded like their holy grail.

Octavia had heard of it, but she'd never seen it. She had seen something about a recording appearing on one of the streaming services, though. Maybe she should make time to watch it. After Rory went to bed, just in case it was something not suitable for kids.

"Ooh, ooh, I got one!" one of the boys said.

It took a minute for the others to fall silent again.

"Yo yo, I'm Thomas Peel

Gonna tell you how my friends and me

Made the Swan River colony real

Want nothing to do with convicts