“It’s Thursday,” Jenna told her gently. The woman had lost days of her life.
Emily squeezed her hand tightly, and Jenna gripped it back. “The rest I remember is like a dream. I walked into this clothing store, and I had a gun. I have no idea why I had a gun. I’ve never touched a gun in my life. But I couldn’t do anything but point it at people. It’s like I wasn’t in control of myself at all.”
Jenna nodded. “I believe you. That’s the drugs we were talking about. They affected your choices.”
“I forced everybody to leave the store. Why would I do that? I have no idea. Then the cops came, and there was this…pain. It was the worst I’d ever felt in my life.”
That was the tail Joaquin’s scientists had put in the subjectification compound. As soon as Emily had done what she was supposed to do, it started to hurt.
“You’re not in pain now, right?”
“No, it hasn’t hurt that way since I woke up in the hospital.” Emily shifted in the bed. “Did I steal something? Or shoot someone? Is that what I did?”
Jenna shook her head. “No, neither of those things, I promise.”
“That’s good, I guess.”
“Is there anything about the store that you can remember? Anything you did after you made everyone leave?”
Jenna didn’t want to mention computers or lead Emily in that direction. She needed the woman to remember on her own.
Emily rubbed her forehead. “I had to do something. I don’t know how to explain it.”
“I understand. You were compelled.” That was the chemical subjectification in a nutshell.
“That sounds ridiculous when you say it out loud. Like I was hypnotized or something.”
“It’s theor something,” Jenna explained gently. “And it’s real. Anything you can remember will help us. It doesn’t matter how small or strange it might seem to you.”
“Fine. It’s hazy, but what I remember from the store after I kicked everyone out was…working on a computer.”
Bingo.
“Tell me about that.” Jenna kept her voice neutral.
“Really? Don’t you think that’s just my brain mixing up my job with what happened? Why would I break in to a clothing store, kick everyone out at gunpoint, then send some sort of transmission via the dark web?”
“Wait. What?” Jenna had been expecting Emily to mention a server—maybe to even remember hacking it. Butsendinga transmission?
Especially via the dark web.
Movies liked to make out the darknet as some sort of evil catchall, consisting of black markets, encryption, and political dissidents.
All of that was true.
But it wasn’t all criminal activity. The darknet was basically a subset of the deep web, which was all content on the internet not indexed by search engines.
And yes, there were very definitely forums and chat boards. If someone wanted to send messages that couldn’t be traced, the dark web was the place to do it.
“I told you it sounded crazy,” Emily whispered.
“No, it doesn’t,” Jenna corrected.
But it did change everything about how she’d been looking at these government servers. Joaquin hadn’t been gathering information; he’d beensendingit.
“Is she legit?” Mark asked in her ear. Jenna didn’t respond verbally, but she nodded so they were sure to see her.
“You accessed Tor via the store’s computer?” Jenna asked Emily.