At first he was disappointed in the size of the bank. Judging from the menu, it could not contain more than six or seven megabytes of information. But once he began scanning documents, he could not believe his eyes. All the information he needed to develop a new breed of computer was there. He took notes for several days and then announced that he had solved the problem of parallel chip connection. The stir the announcement caused made his ego soar.

Von Stradt was aware that Dr. Uemurea had been working on the same problem in Japan. Then terrorists had destroyed the research facility, razed it completely, and killed the staff. Von Stradt refused to ask himself why the information in Small Chips so closely paralleled Uemurea's research.

The Small Chips computer accepted his recognition code and he went immediately to the section he wanted and started making notes. Tomorrow he would start working on drawings and specs. Today he wanted to make sure that he gleaned all the information that would help him from Small Chips data bank. He became so engrossed in note taking, he did not even notice the first few shots.

When an automatic weapon went off in the hall outside the door, he looked up from the terminal. Then there was a frantic beating of fists on the door and Doreen Morrison's voice screaming to be let in. He quickly shut down the computer. He did not want her to guess the source of his inspiration on parallel chip connection.

He unlocked the door and opened it just in time to see his beautiful co-worker drop as bullets tore her body, spraying blood and bits of flesh all over the doorjamb. Ryan was a lot quicker at closing and relocking the door.

He ran to the telephone. The line was dead. It was time to evacuate. To hell with his breakthrough notes. He ran to the window. He was searching for something to use to break the sealed window when the locked door broke inward from a single blow that shattered the jamb. In the doorway stood a person — Von Stradt was not sure of the sex — a person that made his blood run cold. Long black hair was pulled into a ponytail that was doubled back on itself and bound with a rag. The face could have belonged to a prizefighter who had stayed in the ring a few too many years. The shoulders were broad and heavy. The body was covered by a gray mechanic's coverall, on the feet were joggers. The eyes were calm and deadly, the smile not at all warming.

"Thinking of going somewhere?" the person asked. The voice was flat, hoarse. It gave no clue to the sex of the speaker.

Von Stradt found no answer. He stood mutely while the thing glided in and turned on both his personal computer and his terminal to the company mainframe.

"Access codes?" it demanded.

"Uhhh," he stalled, wondering when someone was going to come and wake him from this nightmare.

"An old man down the hall tried to stall me and I poked an eye out," the hoarse voice said.

"Shit," he told the approaching demon.

Two knobby fists hit him on each side of the chest. Ryan fought to take a breath and his body exploded with pain. His knees buckled. He could not breathe, because each breath felt like he was cutting his chest with hot knives.

"Both lungs are pierced by broken ribs," the hoarse voice told him. "You'd better lie on your back and breathe with your diaphragm or you'll never last until help gets here."

He did as he was told. It helped some, but not much. "Get an ambulance," he croaked. Then he coughed and tasted the saltiness of blood.

"No access codes, no help," the voice told him.

Although it was agonizing to talk he mumbled the codes, first for the main computer and then for his personal computer.

After that, he was left alone while the strange being checked through the computer files. In a few minutes, it was through and shoved the terminals to the floor in anger.

"You're not a researcher," the hoarse voice spat. "There's not a single concept worth stealing. You're worthless."

The gray coveralls towered over him, filling his blurry vision. Then a foot came up and stomped down on his chest. The joggers and gray coveralls then left the room. They were the last thing that Ryan von Stradt saw as he choked to death on his own blood.

The police were investigating the crime two hours later when the bombs went off, leveling the Computer Development Company and killing all twelve of the police officers who were inside the building.

July 6, 1535 hours, Plainsfield, New Jersey

Stanley Keen III — known behind his back as Stan Three Sticks — looked down the boardroom table at the management team of Electronic Developments Inc. The general manager, marketing director, sales manager and comptroller all wore gray suits with a fine pinstripe, much like Stan's. The product-development manager, the only other member of the management team, wore the cheapest-looking denim suit that Keen had ever seen. The men all wore white shirts and plain, solid-colored ties, except the product director who wore an open-necked, solid green, uniform shirt. On his feet, which were propped up on the boardroom table, were cowboy boots.

"Are you idiots so bankrupt for ideas that you're going to start stealing them from the Japs?" the product-development manager asked.

"We are not stealing anything!" the comptroller shouted. "We paid the fee to use Small Chips. We're entitled to use all the information it contains."

"I'm all for that," the voice behind the cowboy boots drawled. "What I don't quite understand is why we want to pretend that we thought up the ideas in the first place. Everyone knows that old Uemurea did that work."

"You can't prove that's Uer... Ume... whoever's work," the sales manager said.

"So what? I can sure as hell prove it's not ours. We're not even working in the same area."

Before the four gray-suited managers burst blood vessels, Stan Three Sticks spoke up. "Let's address that question first. What is the advantage, if we claim we came up with the parallel process over giving credit where credit's due?"

"Patents, Mr. Keen. Patents," the general manager exclaimed. They were interrupted by screams and the sound of automatic fire outside the room.

Five gray suits turned toward the door. One pair of cowboy boots disappeared from the boardroom table and carried the owner in a long dive through a window. Five heads swiveled away from the door to look at the shattered window.

The door to the room was broken open and two figures wearing black hard hats peered into the room.

"Nothing but management," said one of the hard-hat wearers.

The other did not say a word. He tossed in a couple of fragmentation grenades and closed the door again. Five figures in gray suits watched fragmentation grenades roll across the room. They died watching.

An hour and ten minutes later, Miss Helen Argue showed the thirty-three pupils in her seventh-grade class into the reception area of Electronic Developments Inc. The students and the teacher were shocked to find that the reception area was decorated with three bullet-riddled bodies. Miss Argue hastily took her pupils back to the bus that had brought them. She had the driver keep them in the bus while she went back to telephone the police.

The police arrived in eight minutes. Miss Argue and four officers were killed when the building blew up. Eighteen pupils were injured, two blinded by flying glass.

Unfortunately for the free-spirited product-development manager, he returned to report to the police when he saw them arrive at the building.