by computer researchers as the name for this type of program.) The worm is eventually activated, and the details of all the government's dark secrets (clandestine genetic experimentation that produces crippled children, bribes and kickbacks from corporations, concealed crimes of high public officials) now become accessible from anywhere on the network – in fact, those most affected by a particular crime of a government official are emailed the full details. In place of the old system, Nick has designed the worm to enforce a kind of utilitarian socialism, with people's worth being defined by their roles in society, not their connections in high places. In effect, the network becomes the entire government and financial system, policing income for illegal money, freezing the accounts of criminals, while making sure money (or credit) flows to places where people are in need. This will only happen fully if the results of a plebiscite, again conducted over the network, allow it. In a final atavistic attempt at revenge, the government orders a nuclear strike by a single aircraft from a local Air Force base. Warned by Hearing Aid, Nick is able to penetrate the military computers and manufacture a counter-order to stop the plane just before it reaches the town. The book ends optimistically, with there being no more privileged hiding of information, no more secret conspiracies of the rich and powerful. Characters Nick Haflinger is a wanderer, a man without a place to call his own, or a people he can identify with. His parents ceased to care for him at an early age, and he became a "rent-a-kid", living with a succession of mobile couples who had no time to settle down and start families of their own. Only when he was noticed by a schoolteacher, and subsequently recruited for Tarnover, did he find a group of people with whom he could identify. Kate Lilleberg is the daughter of a high-powered executive mother and a genius scientist father. She seems content to be a perpetual student, however, until she meets Nick, seeing in him a real person under the false persona. Unlike her friends, she is capable of deep commitment, as exemplified by her fulfilling her promise to her dead father, and caring for the cougar, Bagheera, bred by her father for his researches. Her chosen life has one feature her mother cannot appreciate: it allows her to remain in one place.