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“We weren’t talking about you. Harry came to talk to me about heading east… We have to retrieve the Scepter.”
Hades’ key.
“Zeus already has two,” she said.
“Yeah, and that’s the dilemma. We have to time everything just right. When we pick it up. When we go back to the beta site. When we extract Minotaur’s core… And there’s something else that… I don’t know, it’s worrying him, but he won’t talk about it yet.”
“What something else?”
“At the beta site there was a secondary core. Justice and Retribution Repository: JARR, It’s basically an archive and data processor. Logs and research are stored in it. It’s impossible to extract the information. Once data is sent to JARR, we can’t get it back.”
“What is it for?”
“Depends on who you ask. It was set up to keep a record of all missions, intel, that kind of thing. For more sensitive missions, not everyone is given all the information. Even at the top. Zeus might set the mission and know why we’re doing something, but Garrick’s work to prep us, the intel gathered by Harry and his people, it’s not always shared with everyone.”
“So no one person knows everything about a mission?”
“Yeah, or its aftermath,” Daire said. “The logs… Agents are required to provide a full account of our role in a mission for JARR. Everything, including opinions and fuck ups.”
“If someone could access JARR, they would know everything about everyone at Olympus.” He nodded. “Why would that kind of information be kept?
“It’s not just our records. JARR is automatically set to probe other agency systems to gather and store information from them too. CIA, FBI, Homeland, all of them. Overseas intelligence agencies too, Interpol, you name it. Anything that relates to our objectives, missions, even our code names, JARR collects it. If there’s any hint any other agency or individual is getting too close to something that belongs to Olympus, it’s people or its targets, JARR will notify Minotaur. It was cutting edge AI for its time.”
“JARR tells you if there’s the potential for other agencies to step on your toes or find out too much?”
Again, he nodded. “That’s not all…” Taking his time, Daire drew in a breath before continuing. “There’s the possibility it contains information on soft targets.”
Her brow lowered. “I don’t understand. Soft targets?”
“People like me… Well, not me, but the other guys… Sometimes there’s the possibility that… JARR stores information on their connections, personal connections. Even those they don’t know about.”
“Oh my God,” she said, sinking down to sit on the couch at his side. “Like their parents and siblings?”
“Most of the guys were adopted or raised in foster care. JARR stores that information along with friends, from birth right through their lives. It collects information about biological parents, families the guys might not even know they have.”
“Why?” she asked, overwhelmed by how dangerous that could be if someone got hold of it. “Why would they keep a record like that?”
“Information is power,” he said. “At any time, anyone external or internal could become a threat to Olympus. Exposure counts as a threat.”
“They want to be able to blackmail their own agents?”
“It’s smart to know some things. If a biological parent tries to trace the child they gave up, we need to know someone is snooping into our guys.”
“JARR tells you that?” she asked, sliding a hand onto his thigh.
“JARR is like our overarching protector. Information like that even Harry wouldn’t get into. He does background checks, but there are rules. Garrick helps, but there’s no way he’d know intimate details of every guy.”
“But if it’s just lying around, what’s to stop them going in to look?”
“No one can access it.” That just confused her even more, which Daire must have seen because he reached up to smooth his thumb across her furrowed brow. “Best laid plans … They wanted it to be secure and, of course, none of the three principals trusted each other enough to let one of them have sole access. Even requiring all three was a shady area because, like we know with the keys, things can be stolen. Passwords can be hacked. Nothing to stop anyone chopping off a finger for its print or gouging out an eye.” She winced. “Sorry… But, yeah, they wanted something foolproof. Something unhackable.”
“And they came up with…”
He shrugged. “I don’t know what they settled on. This all happened when I was a kid… They agreed on something, but there was a screw up. Something went wrong. Since then, JARR has been running, even now it runs, but no one can get at what’s inside. JARR will be sending signals to Minotaur, but that’s offline, so…”
“No one can get into it,” Tess said, putting pieces together. “You’re worried about what Minotaur will tell you JARR has been saying since it’s been offline?”
“Minotaur has been offline since the Exodus, June last year. Sure there’s a worry, but JARR only flags things for us every once in a while.”
