There was a scrape and a thump as the door to the trailer's bathroom was closed, and heavy boots crossed the floor. "We're working on it, ma'am. I got my best guy sorting all the deliveries right now."
Andy's eyes twinkled wryly, and he shook his head. "Lord."
"That doesn't help me. I need to know what's here and what's not." The voice snapped back. "We don't have time to waste on your stupidity."
Andrew took his pile of copied papers and sorted them into two piles. He looked up as the super came around the corner. "Sounds like someone's got a bee in their buttocks." He drawled softly.
"Jesus." The super rolled his eyes. "You think you can get me a list of all this stuff?"
"Yeap." Andy allowed. "'Bout an hour, something like that."
"Great." The man ducked back out. "Ma'am, we'll have something for you in about an hour. We just got the invoices in now."
"You'd better, or else your company's going to explain to me why you can't even keep truck deliveries straight." The voice faded, then vanished as the outside door slammed shut.
"What a bitch." Brady snorted. "Sounds like she needs a good screwing."
"You can have her. Not my type." The super also left, closing the door more gently behind him.
Andy went to the small window and looked out, spotting the stocky form of the bigger woman retreating from the trailer. He watched her disappear into the pier building, then he returned to his task, picking up the stacks of papers and going back into the main room.
The other men in the room eyed him, then went back to their work as he took a seat at the end of a long banquet table. He set the papers down and picked up a pencil lying on the table, examining the first page thoughtfully.
When Dar had taken an interest in technology, he'd made a point of going out and reading up on the stuff she'd decided to make her living from. Most of it wasn't that much different from some things he'd encountered in the Navy, but it had its own language.
Since he'd retired, he'd taken the opportunity to delve a little deeper into the subject, and he felt he was almost at a point where he could at least have a somewhat all right discussion with his kid about it. So when he looked at the pages and pages of parts, at least the names and descriptions were somewhat familiar to him.
It seemed like they'd been shipped without any mind to what went with what though. Andy scratched his head and frowned. He knew the names, but had to admit that the functions of each of the gizmos were somewhat foggy, and he really had no way of guessing which part went with the next except by actually guessing.
Darn it.
"Wall." With a shake of his head he started sorting out the bits by the maker, figuring at least if he put all the ones from the same place together it was a start.
"That's a mess, yeah?" Brady looked over at him. "What a bunch of morons shipping that stuff."
"Yeap." Andrew scribbled some notes down. "Pain in mah butt, tell you that. Don't know what them folks was thinking."
Brady got up and looked over his shoulder. "Weren't." He commented briefly. "You got a background in this sort of thing? Thought you were just a loader."
"Done some stuff." Andy answered. "Spent thirty years in the Navy, had to learn something."
"Wow." Brady's attitude altered abruptly. "Really? Were you out on the ships?"
Pale blue eyes peeked up at him. "That is what the Navy does," he replied. "But ah tell ya what, someone be this disorganized on a carrier, they'd be pitched overboard or sent shoreside fastern' you could spit at 'em."
"Yeah." The paymaster agreed. "They don't seem to know what they're doing, you know. Like everyone's doing their own thing, and nobody's coordinating. Then you get those bitches like that one coming in here and thinking they own the joint."
"Woman did have her an attitude." Andy nodded. "Ain't a way to get things done."
"Yeah." Brady said again. "Maybe we should stop jumping when she barks. That way she'll back off."
"Could be." The ex-SEAL agreed mildly. "I sure wouldn't be saluting her, that's for damn sure."
Brady wandered off, going over to the other table and leaning over to talk to two of the men sitting there working. Andy peeked over at him, then put his head back down with a smile, continuing his sorting.
DAR PUSHED THE door to the computer center opened with a stiff armed motion, almost hitting one of the techs on his way out. "Sorry."
The tech jumped out of the way and stammered own apology, then slunk out past her as she walked on by. Dar went past the MIS command desk and headed for Mark's office, where she could hear voices already raised in excited conversation. "Hey."
Mark's head jerked up as she entered. "Oh, hey, boss." He greeted her. "Check this out!"
Dar obligingly circled his desk and focused her attention on the small, silver gray box sitting on top of it. "I'm checking. What is it?"
Mark turned it over and displayed a circuit board. "Integrated unit, plugged into our extra port for the projector down there, and get this..." he slid a small panel aside, "cellular."
Dar peered at it. "No kidding?"
"No shit, "Mark said. "They dialed in and activated it, sent the worm in over the cell link, then had it refocus out the network port. If Kerry hadn't found it...Jesus."
Dar picked up the device and studied it closely. "Damn."
"Yeah."
"That's pretty sophisticated." Mark's assistant, the lanky Peter, spoke up. "I checked it out on the web last night. That's like...black bag stuff."
"Mm." Dar nodded in agreement. "It sure is." She looked up. "So, tell me why we didn't catch a rogue MAC on the network?"
Peter stuck his hands in his pockets. Mark cleared his throat.
"Will you excuse us, please?" Dar looked at Peter. "And close the door on your way out."
The tall man escaped gratefully, shutting the door and leaving them alone in the office.
Mark gave her a look that could easily have been one of Chino's when caught stealing cookies from the closet. "It's not an excuse." He temporized. "But it's that damn projector. We've had it fixed like six times in the last four weeks."
"And?"
"So the guy told me last time he thought it was the MAC blocking that was making it freak out." Mark admitted.
"So you turned it off."
"For that port, yeah." He agreed. "It fixed the problem."
Dar folded her arms, then she walked over to Mark's office window and looked out. "That's a breach of our security policy." She remarked quietly, keeping her eyes focused outward as there was no answer behind her. "Here I have Kerry beating herself up for not asking for a scan, and the fact is the room was left deliberately wide open."
Mark shifted in his chair, the leather squeaking softly. "You want my resignation?" He asked, in a somber voice. "It was my screw up, Dar. I took the security off that port, not one of my guys."
Dar found a small boat to watch as it skittered across the water. "What I'm more interested in right now is who knew you did it, other than you and the projector tech."
Mark remained silent for a few moments. "I don't know, boss. I didn't tell anyone here."
Dar turned and leaned against the window. "So then either someone here just happened to see the change in the switch and got bought...or we have a problem with a vendor, because whoever put that..." She pointed viciously at the device. "Sure knew it."
Mark relaxed just a trifle. "You think it was one of those Telegenics goons, right?"
Did she? It was tempting to. They were in the room and no doubt about it, they had a motive. And yet... "That's more tech than Shari's capable of, and damn it, I think Michelle's too ethical for it."
"Huh."
"But you never know. Let's start hunting." Dar decided. She headed for the door, stopping as she reached it and turning. "No, I don't want your damn resignation. I screwed up, Kerry screwed up, you screwed up...that's it. We've exhausted our once in a blue moon big time. No more screw ups."