~

Chapter Two

~

I wasn’t worried about Ike. Just curious. That proves I’m capable of emotion, I think. So I dashed out a few lines of code to grant me access to the Northerners’ telecom giant, and began pingin’ Ike’s number, and did the same for Frip and Ponwr. Not really surprised they appeared to be in three separate tower zones in the center of human-land.

Not likely. Ike and his trolls’ hips are glued together, lately.

Pretty sneaky, cousin Ike. Who do ya have hackin’ proprietary systems for ya? Ya’re a database wonk, so know it wasn’t ya. Took me five seconds to come up with a guilty party.

Toozla.

Sneaky little ogre. I messaged her. Took her three seconds to reply back with a denial. I messaged her that she’s a most disingenuous sort. And that I’m proud of her.

She replied with an emoticon of a raised middle finger. If I knew what love is, I’d say I could love her.

“Why’s he goin’ to such extremes?” I messaged her.

“Prolly meetin’ a favorite hen,” she replied.

I think not.

“Assume they’re smack dab in the center where their cells are pingin’,” I typed.

“Don’t know what ya’re talkin’ about.” That would have made me snort, if I wasn’t an ogre.

“I would have just disabled their dynamic ping,” I typed.

“What’s that? Ya can do that?”

I imagined myself snortin’. I replied with the functions she should have hacked. She replied back with a surprised smiley face.

I asked her if they were at risk when they actually used their cells. She replied with three question marks. Toozla’s sneaky, but clearly hasn’t figured out how humans tend to design their systems. Very wonky. That’s why my architecture is designed around the data, not the user interface. And very superior.

“Pull yar hack,” I messaged her. “I’ll fix it.”

I wrote my workaround, re-pinged the numbers until their actual location showed up, then zinged the telecom’s database. Tada. The signatures totally disappeared from any towers, like they didn’t exist.

I messaged Ike. “I’ve fixed yar cells so ya can use ’em without ya bein’ tracked.”

He didn’t reply for five minutes. Probably makin’ up a good lie. Or runnin’ from someone who was shootin’ at him. Or makin’ time with that special hen Toozla suggested.

Was listenin’, okay, ease droppin’, on a conference call when he claimed, “Went outside the company to protect ya from doin’ anythin’ illegal.”

“Since when is Toozla on the outside?” If I’m easily amused, I would have chuckled. Not somethin’ ogre bulls do much. More a troll thin’.

“Did Nuel cause a scene?” he messaged.

“Duh. Now ya can call her back.”

~

Nuel

~

My bladder almost relaxed too much when my cell showed the incomin’ call from Ike. I answered with, “Why didn’t ya tell me ya were goin’ North?”

“Hi to ya too,” he said. “Didn’t want the drama. Do ya blame me?”

My face flashed hot. Drama? Drama? He claimin’ I’m a drama queen? I’m no drama queen. Like I care if he lives or dies. The jerk. “Like I care where ya go,” I hissed at him.

“Ya didn’t hurt Kriz, did ya?”

“Why would I care anythin’ about that little—”

“Don’t be mean,” Ike interrupted. “He’s my favorite cousin.”

“Liar. Why ya bringin’ up that dweeb, anyway?” I asked.

“Evidently,” he said, “he found a hole in my little cloak of invisibility.”

What did that mean? “What? Did he actually call ya?” Didn’t see that comin’. He was so busy, the jerk.

“I’m negotiatin’ to bring an entire troll labor union home,” he said.

Guess we were done talkin’ about Kriz the idjit. “I’d be happy to see ya spendin’ yar time runnin’ OW, and not socially re-engineerin’ the world.”

“UW,” he corrected. “I’m on the Black Lake Council, a clan leader. Folk expect thin’s from me. Not somethin’ I can ignore.”

“And run OW, uh, UW, on the board of UI, play basketball with humans, keep yar neighbors calm, and talk to yar ma every Friday night, like a good ogreling.” My words might have sounded angry. Don’t know why all that irritated me. Worse, I could have mentioned, eats lunch every day with Wizper and Darshee—when he’s on the Plain. Sometimes they invite me. Okay, usually.

“See, ya do understand that I’m a busy ogre.”

That supposed to explain why it was so hard to spend an hour of downtime with me?

He got down to why he called, that is, what he wanted from me. Wasn’t ’cause I’d left him a dozen messages. Needed his signature on a PO. Was concerned, at least curious if he was still alive or not. Yearned to converse with my best friend.

No.

He explained that because I seemed to create a good rapport with the average troll, he wanted me to set up some contacts in their clans in the Range who could share what their lives are like there.

“I’m yar VP of Cyber Security. That isn’t really in my purview. And I’m no clan leader, no council leader. Pretty much think it’s stupid for giants to uproot just because there’s a bit of prejudice bloomin’ right now in the North.”

He sighed. “Are ya through?”

“Not by a tiny amount,” I groused.

“And I thought I could rely on ya,” he murmured.

Hmm.

He maybe had a point. “Where are they supposed to live?” My voice might have gone up a couple octaves. “There’s no new buildin’ allowed in the Range.”

“The Range isn’t the only place to live in the South.” His voice sounded like a bull explainin’ the product rule of multiplication to an ogreling.

“Ya said, home. Assumed ya meant the Range.”

His sigh was pronounced again. “Most trolls called the Wildes home, until the Covenant expired. There’s plenty livin’ on the east, west, and north slopes now. They’d get cranky with all the human visitors at the Lake, anyway.”

A lot of truth to the latter. I get cranky when I’m surrounded by humans all day long. Livin’ on the Central Plain has been wonderful in that regard. Not that I’ll admit that to anyone out loud. But I’m not a social engineer. Gettin’ involved in all this dark politickin’ rubs against my short hairs.

“I’m not the best person to—”

“Look—” The volume of his voice hurt my ear. “Never mind.”

The time clicker on my cell had faded away.