Dragon in the System

Chapter 6

Lori nodded. She wasn't sure why, but she'd have expected him to be good at his job. Despite his seeming absentmindedness, Eric possessed an underlying air of confidence.

He went on. "So I finally tracked down the physical location where the virus may have been originally inserted. It ended up being an old janitor's closet in the subbasement of the Admin building. Seems there's an old phone line down there that never got disconnected, so he's using a hard-wire modem instead of the Wi-Fi. So anyway, last night, about this time, actually, I decided to go take a look." He drained his remaining ale in a single swallow, then looked up and grinned as a pretty little co-ed brought them their pizza.

"Thanks, Megan," he told the perky blonde. "Refill?"

She took his beer glass and nodded happily. As she turned to leave, Lori cleared her throat pointedly. "Hey, Megan."

Megan, looking bored now, turned. Ha! She did have dark roots, Lori noted nastily.

Lori handed the girl her empty wineglass. "Bring me a Diet Coke, please." She looked over at Eric and shrugged. "Since I'm driving."

Megan grunted what Lori optimistically took to be a vague affirmative and wandered back toward the kitchen. Lori turned her gaze back to Eric.

"Okay, so you decided to go check this crook out, at night, alone, in the subbasement of Harrison Hall. And you yelled at me for not locking my car doors."

He shrugged, coloring a little. Lori had never met a man who blushed so easily and she decided it was kind of cute.

"Yeah," he admitted sheepishly. "It was probably stupid, but there you go. When I get caught up in something, I never seem to notice details like what time it is. Otherwise I wouldn't have called your office at eight o'clock on a Friday night and expected you to be there."

He had a point, she acknowledged. Of course the fact that she had been in also said something about her that she'd rather not examine too closely. She nodded, encouraging him to keep talking.

"So I go down there and I realize the lights probably haven't totally worked in like, twenty years. It's like something out of a fantasy video game, all damp stonework and dimly lit corridors. I'm half expecting something to pop out at me - too many years of playing Dungeons and Dragons, I guess."

Bingo, Lori thought. That's exactly what she'd assumed. He looked around helplessly for his missing beer. His expressive face was so very easy to read, that Lori couldn't help feeling a little sorry for him. "Megan should be back in a second," she told him gently.

He nodded, apparently remembering. "Megan. Right." Instead of going on with his story, though, he took off his glasses and polished them, causing Lori to grind her teeth.

"So you were down in the creepy subbasement. Then what?"

"Right." He nodded again as he replaced his glasses. "So I found the janitor's closet, which was covered in spider webs and dust, but had a brand new Dell desktop set up on this old wooden crate. No chair or anything, just a big clear patch in the dust on the floor in front of it. It was shut down, so I hit the switch, booted it up. It was encrypted right at the logon, though and I didn't have any code breakers with me, so I just switched it off again, figuring I'd have maintenance come get it, bring it up to my lab, so I could figure out who's been using it. Then I heard this noise out in the hallway, sort of like footsteps, but not quite. There was also this kind of clicking like a big dog's toenails on the tile. So I go to check it out."

He stopped, as Megan returned with drinks and a simpering smile for Eric, who didn't seem to notice. "Thanks, Megan," Lori muttered. "Bye-bye now."

"Yeah," the waitress muttered. "Like, enjoy your food." Lori was sure she didn't hear, "I hope you choke on it," muttered as the younger woman stalked off. Lori grinned and attacked the slice of pizza that had been cooling on a plate in front of her. Mouth full of the decadent blend of meats and cheeses, she motioned for Eric to continue, which he did, between bites.

"Anyway, I see a shadow moving about twenty feet or so down the hallway, so I yell, 'Hey, who's there?' and take off after it. As I round the next corner, all I see is this huge tail, heading off into one of the steam tunnel openings. By the time I get there, the door to the tunnel has slammed shut and it's locked tight."

"Tail?" Lori asked, swiping furiously at a string of cheese hanging most un-gracefully from the corner of her mouth. "Like a lizard tail?"

He nodded, chewing thoughtfully. "Bi-i-ig lizard tail. Like the tail, alone, was maybe eight or nine feet long."

Lori whistled. "That's big. Bigger than any lizard I know, probably even a Komodo dragon. Maybe a saltwater crocodile, but we're nowhere near the ocean."

"That's what I was afraid of," he muttered, casting his eyes down to his plate. He played absently with a slice of pepperoni. Finally, she gave into the urge she'd been fighting all night and put his hand over his to stop him. Sparks seemed to shoot up her arm at the touch.

"Eric," she said quietly. "Have you considered that it was probably all a prank? Lizards can't open and lock doors. Even if they did have hands, they're just not that smart." She hoped Q never heard her say that. He'd sulk for a week.

Eric nodded. He dropped the pepperoni and turned his hand so that it was holding onto hers. She liked the warm, tingly feeling of her smaller hand clasped firmly in his large one, so she left it there.

"Of course," he said agreeably. "Logic dictates that it had to be. Either that, or some of the kids got hold of a passkey and are playing a round of live action D & D, with really good costumes. There are a bunch of logical possibilities and none of them involves a genuine lizard."