My name is David Brown. I’m in my dorm room, staring through a shattered window as the police hold back protestors that hate me and my family. My father was Ray Brown, the world acclaimed software genius who developed the code for Atlas, the first computer system that could speak intelligently. Just like the computer in the old Star Trek series. Everybody admired my father, but his final act was to release a lethal computer virus into the Internet and shut down computers all over the world.
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I was eleven when the virus roared across the Internet. They say more than a million people died before the virus was terminated and the computers restarted. He was one of those who didn’t make it.
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I got a big surprise this morning --- a time-delayed email dated ten years in the past. A message from my father. He claims to have discovered a virus hidden in the new Atlas release, and he is trying to track down its developers. Either my father was delusional or someone framed him for a crime he didn’t commit. If I could prove his innocence, my name would be cleared and maybe I’d have a normal life. Of course, if I dig into this, the people who murdered him will come after me.
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I have to know the truth, wherever it takes me. What have I got to lose?
