Zero Sum Read online

  “I think we Yangs don’t like to be told what to do.” Cayson shrugged. “Or be forced to do what we don’t want to do, like having implants in our heads—you know, against our will.”

  “I hear you.” Stella shifted on the rock. “Any word on Kelvin?”

  “No. Leland and Dmitri’s associates are searching for him now. There’s nothing more we can do beyond looking, looking, looking.”

  “Associates? What sort of associates?” Stella looked around, wondering—no, assuming—someone was listening.

  Tired hikers milled about on the top of the world. They clearly didn’t care one way or another that Kelvin Gallagher was still missing. The world spun on even if Kelvin was in mortal danger.

  “Everyone. He has friends who would help us.”

  “And enemies who would do us harm.”

  Cayson stared at her. “You never switch off work, do you?”

  Stella wasn’t sure how to answer that. While she had only been in the NCIJTF for a couple of years, it had been intense every week for that length of time. Like an over-the-top battle for survival.

  Only deadlier.

  “We’re all stumped,” Cayson added. “Raj is making it into a case study. How do you track someone who has vanished?”

  “You know the answer. We never totally vanish in this day and age.”

  “Ah, therein is the paradox.” Cayson smiled. “Unfortunately, even the best hackers in the world can’t find him.”

  “You’re assuming that Binary Systems has the best hackers in the world.”

  “I’m saying exactly that.”

  Stella didn’t respond to that stroke of pride. Or arrogance.

  Stella wondered where Leland was now. She was probably not in Moscow.

  Ah, a story for another day.

  “So how about my job offer?” Cayson asked again, as if his question required an answer.

  “When do you need to know?”

  “Soon, I hope.” Cayson smiled. “Maybe I can persuade you.”

  “How?”

  “By spending more time with you.”

  “That would be counterproductive.” Stella leaned away. “Besides, what would we be doing together?”

  “I don’t know. Coffee. A walk in the park. Whatever you want.”

  Coffee? That’s harmless.

  “A walk in the park? That doesn’t sound like business.”

  “Business?” Cayson seemed taken aback. “Oh yes, the job at my company.”

  “Lost your train of thought?”

  “I was just remembering last year…”

  Me too.

  “I meant it.”

  I know you did.

  Cayson stood up and pulled Stella to her feet. “Well, we have five or six hours of daylight left. The first order of business is to hike down this mountain.”

  Stella brushed off bits of dirt and wet grass from her pants.

  “Then coffee?” Cayson lifted his eyebrows.

  “We can start with coffee and go from there,” Stella said quietly.

  “To lunch, maybe?”

  “Or dinner, depending.”

  “I’d like that.” He reached for Stella’s hand.

  She didn’t pull away.

  “Marry me?” Cayson suddenly said.

  Two words. He seemed to have made it simple for himself.

  Stella wondered how many times he’d practiced that. “Where did that come from?”

  “My heart.” Cayson knelt down. “But you could’ve guessed. Since that day in the open field…”

  In the forests around Dahlonega…

  Stella had thought about it too. And prayed about it for months since they had gone their separate ways after Atlanta. She knew what she would say if he ever popped the question.

  Then again, could it be too soon?

  Her heart wanted to say yes to being with Cayson the rest of her life.

  Her head said they should wait a bit.

  Stella wrapped her arms around Cayson’s waist. “I need time to process this.”

  “This?”

  “Our future together.”

  Cayson looked disappointed.

  “Ask me again?” Stella whispered.

  “Just so you know, I’ve prayed about it.”

  “So have I.” Stella kissed the edge of Cayson’s lips. “We will know when we both have God’s peace about it.”

  Cayson nodded, as if understanding.

  They stood there, hugging, nothing more to say until Cayson broke their silence. “But now, coffee.”

  “Yes. Let’s go get coffee.”

  And they held hands all the way down the mountain.

  At the bottom of the mountain, Cayson asked her again.

  And Stella said, “Yes.”

  Thank You for Reading ZERO SUM

  Thank you for reading Zero Sum, Book 1 in the Binary Hackers series. There are some major concepts in this book that I hope was interesting to you.

  As a former computer programmer, I am well aware of the implications of technology in our world. This entire Binary Hackers series is actually the prequel to another series that I have been working on since the nineties, which I have not yet published.

  Binary Hackers is a mix of futuristic technology and science fiction set in the not-too-distant future, in which I explore what would happen if humans did this and that. For example, Zero Sum explores the idea that if you surgically embed cybernetic implants in your body (whether a chip in your hand or in your scalp), you could run the risk of losing your freedom of self. That’s what Cayson Yang, my protagonist, finds out when he is forced to receive an implant in his head.

  On a spiritual level, my main character finds comfort praying to God and seeking His Word, even as he suffers through the ordeal. I want to remind my readers and myself that in our times of hardship, God brings other Christians to comfort us. In Zero Sum, Cayson’s cousin Leland, counseling pastor Byron Moss from another series, and his love interest, Stella, all offer him support and encouragement.

  I hope you enjoyed the story of Cayson and Stella. If you did, would you write a review of the book? Reviews are very helpful to other readers. Please follow the link below to post your review on a retailer site. Thank you very much!

  Zero Sum (Binary Hackers Book 1)

  JanThompson.com/zerosum

  Continue reading for information about Zero Day, the next book in the Binary Hackers series.

  The Next Book is ZERO DAY

  Binary Hackers Book 2

  A maligned hacker.

  A Mossad agent.

  A mutual enemy.

  No longer of any use to the governments who once coveted his cybercriminal mind, disgraced hacker Kelvin Gallagher finds himself languishing in Prague while waiting for his enemies to find him and end his sufferings. Along comes a Mossad agent, once a friend, but now determined to take him home in a body bag…

  Zero Day is book 2 in my Binary Hackers series of inspirational near-future cyberthrillers combining technothriller and romance. If you’re looking for clean suspense without compromising faith, these books might be for you.

  I started writing Zero Day when I wondered what would happen to a hacker who straddles the fence between wanting to do what is right while doing all the wrong things. Whereas in Zero Sum (book 1), I explore the problems with cybernetic implants, Zero Day (book 2) takes us behind the scenes to the other side, to the people who made those implants for a nefarious purpose, and to the moral battles in their minds.

  We met Kelvin in the first pages of Zero Sum, shortly before he was whisked away to parts unknown. In Zero Day, we pick up his story some months afterwards.

  The prisoner awaits…

  Down and out and waiting to die, mercenary hacker Kelvin Gallagher regrets betraying his homeland. Rejected by everyone, Kelvin has no choice but dig deeper into the dark hole into which he has fallen.

  He remembers his ex-employers at Binary Systems Inc., who have given him a job when nobody else dared. Are Cays
on Yang and Leland Yang-Joule more moral than he is? He thinks not. Aren’t they all working for money?

  Yeah, life is worth more than money. Kelvin knows that, but it’s too late. Way too late as he sits in a rat-infested rundown building in Old Prague, fearful and in anguish.

  The executioner comes…

  As an act of revenge, former Mossad agent Yona Epstein tracks down the American traitor who led her mentor to the slaughterhouse. It makes Yona angry that Kelvin used to be a friend, back when they worked together in a project.

  When Yona uncovers Kelvin’s hideout in Europe, she realizes she isn’t the only one who wants Kelvin dead. That makes her pause.

  To kill or not to kill…

  When Kelvin explains to Yona his version of the cybercrime nightmare of his own making, several events don’t match up with what Yona has been told by her associates.

  Is Kelvin innocent after all? Should Yona delay the execution until she finds out what is going on? Or proceed based on the information she already has? She trusts her sources, doesn’t she?

  Zero Day (Binary Hackers Book 2)

  JanThompson.com/zeroday

  Binary Hackers

  JanThompson.com/binary

  Book News from Jan Thompson:

  JanThompson.com/newsletter

  ZERO DAY Chapter 1 Sneak Peek

  Binary Hackers Book 2

  Tuna and shrimp for dinner tonight wouldn’t have smelled this bad to Kelvin Gallagher if it hadn’t been from a can he shared with Mordecai the stray cat who came to his fourth floor hideout every couple of nights to kill rats for him.

  This hadn’t been how Kelvin envisioned his last days on earth, sitting on death row in a condemned building in Old Town Prague, waiting for God to take him to Heaven where he expected to feast at the table with the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

  Meanwhile, cat food.

  Kelvin gagged.

  He pushed the can away, and as if on cue, His Royal Catness appeared through the crack in the broken wooden slats in the window, trotting toward the heavenly smell.

  “Have it all.” Again. “Don’t worry about me. I need to lose weight, anyway.”

  It was dusk outside. It felt like dusk. But he dared not peek out of the window, as if doing so would hasten his own demise.

  Someone would see him.

  The elderly grandmother two doors down was the only person who knew he was hiding in this building, only because she had fed him dried pork and leftover pickled vegetables every now and then. And because she allowed him to take a quick shower in her house once a week to conserve water.

  Tereza’s heart of gold could get her killed.

  I must leave. But where do I go?

  No passport. No work visa. No money.

  He was now an illegal alien in the Czech Republic, dumped here by rogue Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation agents who had wrestled him out of Aspasia’s hands. They had no use for him any more since MedusaNet was all but shut down. So they dropped him off in Prague to protect themselves from liability.

  Yeah, liability.

  Those former FSB agents were more like mercenaries, thinking they would earn a whole lot more American dollars freelancing than if they had worked as salaried employees of the Russian government.

  Ironically, they hadn’t left him here in the pursuit of money. They had left him here for assassins to find him—if Aspasia didn’t find him first.

  Kelvin berated himself repeatedly for not asking those people for at least a fake passport and some koruny české or maybe even euro banknotes.

  “I’m all alone. I have to get out of this myself.” Kelvin wrapped his arms around his bended knees and leaned back against the wall, paint peeling off here and there. “Where are you, God? I need a miracle. I need a miracle.”

  Why didn’t God stop him from leaving Atlanta eight months before? If he had remained in town, his employers at Binary Systems would have found them.

  What choice did he have, honestly? There he was that fateful day in September, walking around the convention floor, snacking and picking up free merchandise, when out of the corner of his eye he spotted Aspasia walking toward the YottaFlops booth that he and his employer, Cayson Yang, had set up.

  He wanted to warn Cayson, but he saw the woman spray some sort of liquid in Cayson’s face. Then he watched his boss go down just before she stabbed the side of his head with some sort of device.

  Which he later found out to have activated the cybernetic implant in Cayson’s head.

  She looked up from the floor and stared straight at Kelvin.

  Kelvin remembered dropping the 3D-printed bobblehead doll of himself, and running for his life. It didn’t help that he had worn a bright yellow tee shirt.

  Aspasia caught up with him in no time, with those FSB agents not too far behind her.

  And here I am.

  Well, yeah, by way of Moscow, but that was the part Kelvin didn’t want to think about.

  “Meow.”

  Looking past the cat, Kelvin saw the empty can on the old wooden floor.

  “That’s all I got, buddy.” Kelvin shuffled his way to his makeshift bed at a corner of the room.

  His bed was a pile of old, torn blankets he had salvaged from the neighborhood dumpsters. On top of it was a plastic bag he had stuffed with rags. He puffed it up and put his head on it.

  Mordecai came over and sat on the blanket with him. He cleaned his gray fur, speckled with white.

  “When I leave this place, I’ll take you with me, okay?” Kelvin tapped his head. The cat purred. “That is, if I physically leave. If I die, then I can’t keep my word, you know.”

  The gray cat settled down at an edge of Kelvin’s blanket and began to clean his paws.

  Kelvin felt thirsty. He stared at the crack in the ceiling. He worried that the ceiling would cave in, though ironically it would usher in a faster death for him.

  Was death the only way out?

  He wasn’t sure.

  He tried to pray, but no words came to his mind or mouth. He had been a churchgoer back in Atlanta, in his younger carefree days when he wanted to do everything right in the eyes of God.

  No eventuality like this ever crossed his mind.

  No, his goal was to buy his mother a house on the beach on Tybee Island, provide her with a personal chef and housekeeper. She could spend her days reading books on the balcony overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.

  That had been his goal.

  Until her lung cancer worsened, and Kelvin needed money quickly before time ran out. She never went into remission, and three months after the chemotherapy, she asked to be taken off treatment so that she could die in peace at home.

  That had been when Aspasia showed up, offering Kelvin a job behind the job. All he had to do was plant backdoors into their network they were constructing for Birmingham Bytes, a British company with international clients.

  Kelvin dusted off his hacking skills and joined the covert team. It was a win-win. He could moonlight the project and still keep his day job as a system administrator at Binary Systems.

  He would walk away with a cool ten million dollars.

  Easy money.

  Yeah.

  The cat snuggled next to him, and Kelvin closed his eyes.

  He saw his mother laughing and smiling, walking at the ocean’s edge on Tybee Island against a backdrop of the five-million-dollar oceanfront home he had bought for her. He still had another five million to splurge on her.

  He remembered how his mother kissed him on the forehead in their last days together, just as she had done all his life whenever he had been a good boy. Little did she know that he had sold his soul to buy her the mansion.

  And two months later, she passed away.

  The beachfront house, paid in cash through an overseas company, became vacant after Mother died. Kelvin didn’t want to stay there.

  Soon thereafter, Birmingham Bytes went out of business and its assets were sold to pay off their debts. Lit
tle did anyone know that MedusaNet would be sold to Molyneux, a terrorist at large who had stolen from everybody from MI-6 to the CIA and everyone in between.

  The other shoe dropped when Kelvin learned that the network he had been hired to test and protect was none other than MedusaNet.

  He had no choice but to do what Aspasia wanted. She threatened to kill his mother. Even though she was dying of cancer, Kelvin wanted to give her the best end-of-life care ever.

  After Aspasia let him go home for his mother’s funeral, he sold the beach house, breaking even, and tried to return the money to Aspasia. She wouldn’t take it.

  She simply wouldn’t take it back.

  If he had…

  If only…

  Nah.

  Hindsight could not save him now. “I reaped what I sowed.”

  Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

  Galatians 6:7 couldn’t help him now. The deed had been done.

  In fact, Aspasia had threatened him with death if he went to the authorities.

  There was no way Kelvin could go to the police at all. He would end up implicating himself. That company, Birmingham Bytes, no longer existed. It had served its purpose, and now was absorbed into the MedusaNet systems.

  Too late.

  “Everything is too late.” Kelvin sighed as rain fell on the roof.

  He opened his eyes and jumped out of bed. He gathered up a few cups and a can, opened the window slightly and placed the chipped cups and dented cans on the window sill. Rainwater dripped into the cups.

  “Thank you, God, for water.” Kelvin stuck his head out, and washed his hair in the rain.

  The night was dark and he could not see beyond the dim moonlight. He prayed that nobody saw his face out here.

  Outside his windows were rows of tiled roofs—red during the day—stretching all the way to the Vltava River, or at least the street in front of it.