Jake Whitman had spent the last 20 years of his life working on some of the most sophisticated types of virtual reality and neuronet technologies in the world. Since retiring he now uses his fortune, knowledge, and gadgets to become one of the top cyber detectives in the country. I never dreamed that when she walked into my office I would end up running for my life from the people that I was hired to protect. That was just what happened though when I traced the cyber-attacks back to the office of their CFO. Chapter 1: Getting the case It had been a month since I had retired from Gigatronics and decided to start a cyber detective. I woke up early so I would be able to shower, shave, and be at the office with time to setup for my first day. I bought some coffee on my way and then drove to work. I pulled in the parking lot with still an hour before opening and was shocked to find someone waiting in their car in front of my office. I opened my car door and walked upto the office. I had pulled my keys out of my pocket when I hear te clicking of her high-hells on the pavement. I turned around to see a tall, curvy redheaded woman with a desperate look on her face. “Are you Jade Whitman?” she asked. I look at her for a moment before I finally answered “Yes, and you are?”. I held out my hand. She stuck out her own hand and shook mine. “I am Kathy LaMond. I apologize for being so early before you officially open but once you here the matter I am sure you will see that there is little time to waste.” “Come on in then Ms. LaMond and tell me the whole story.” I turned back and unlocked the door. I opened it and held the door for her. She entered the office will me following right behind. I took a seat at my new desk and motioned for her sit. She took the chair face the desk and look straight at me with that look of desperation I saw earlier. “Please call me Kathy.” Then for the time I saw a hint of a smile. “I work for Alltronics and we have been have problems with hackers. I know that doesn't sound urgent but a little background will give you a bigger picture. Alltronics has been working on some components for a new defense system. We keep the documentation and the program on different servers and limit the access to any one part. Yesterday one of IT managers was doing some maintenance and found that someone had breached our firewall and accessed one of the servers. They managed to download a partial copy of the documentation. Our people have tried to find where the attacks are coming from but once they traced it back to university the trail went cold.” “Sounds as though your bosses have quite a problem on their hands. There are a few gadgets I helped develop that I am sure will be of help to track down the person or group responsible. I will take the job for two reasons: 1. It sounds like the type of challenge I need and 2. you have a nice smile and should use it more often.” “Thank you Mr. Whitman, both for taking the case and the compliment. I had read some of your papers and I knew right away that when I saw an ad saying you were going into the detective business that you would be the right person for the job. I need to return to work but if you come around in a few hours I will show you around and you can get started.” She stands up and so do I. I walk around the desk. “Please, call me Jake, Kate.” I hold out my hand but instead of shaking it she grabs my hand a pulls me over for a hug.