[Cynthia Rawson - Sunday June 10th, 2075; Somewhere in the Matrix] #14
Ooh, conspiracy! Who doesn't love a bit of conspiracy!
At least it explains the hunt going on in the Matrix. What with KE hunting cop killers, conspiracy theorists wanting to prove that everything they've been warning the world about is true and those that want to find the man in hope of a reward... And, if this conspiracy bit is not a complete invention, from the attackers trying to get their hands on the woman... Yeah, no surprise there's a lot of people looking after the same things.
Cynthia wonders from which group of those her hunter-turned-prey is a part of.
Would be nice if he were from KE. Even better still, from the no-doubt-evil-and-thrice-damned-conspirators. Not that there's much chance of that, even if they do happen to exist. Still, this situation could have turned ugly fast if she got that dubious luck. Her meat is probably taken by a case of cold sweat right now. And probably a shiver of excitement...
One thing that makes her suspicious is how the "Hero of Washington Rec" became Wanted on such a scale. The man could work for rivals of the killers, holding on the woman until he can manage to retrieve the suitcase? Seems plausible enough. However, if it were the case, he should have extensive backup, and the killers - at least those that got out of Mercy General - should be under at least as much heat as him. And while they are wanted, it doesn't appear to be on the same scale.
Maybe there's some truth in this after all. At least in so far as there's something going on. Cynthia briefly considers dropping the matter entirely: either it's nothing, and all this noise will lead nowhere ; or there's really something, and it could really become dangerous if she were to find something. Well, find something and let someone know. But she quickly decides to continue, for if she doesn't ignore the potential dangers, she finds all this to be the most exciting situation she was in since...well, entirely too long. And she doesn't intend to pass on this type of fun.
She's glad that the Sprite she sicced on her hunter-turned-prey is in no danger to be found: once the Snoop was initiated, the Sprite could be on the other side of the Matrix and it wouldn't change anything. At worst, the target will find her Mark but that won't tell him a lot, even supposing that he is able to guess who put that mark on him. Most probably this guy being a hacker who has done bad stuff this session - according to GOD at least - will need to reboot his deck at some point to avoid incuring GOD's wrath and would be none the wiser.
Reassured that she's in no danger at this point, Cynthia looks into what this Snoop gave her so far.
Once this is done, she will compile a new Data Sprite asking it to use this new data and everything she has found up to know as a base to gather a file with anything it can find on the man (who he is and who he works for), the doctor (did he come under any kind of scrutiny, from people thinking he might have heard when the courrier (allegedly) told the code to the woman?) and the killer themselves (who are they?) and send it to her 'link, updating it every ten minutes for a total of one hour.
Even if the Data Sprite is the best at staying hidden, she still has to keep the risks in mind. That's why she asks that before an update, the sprite checks if it is marked or has a cookie on itself. If so, it will attempt to erase the mark/cookie. If it cannot, then it will abort the mission. Since Cynthia will be "napbooting", she is immune to a trace, so it doesn't matter too much if at some point the Sprite is marked. The thing she must be careful of hower is a Snoop: and checking for marks just before sending data is enough to avoid this danger.
The Sprite sent on her quest, unless something huge comes up in the data extracted with the Snoop, Cynthia will reboot herself for a well deserved nap.