Mitch. Miiiitch. You know what kind of data trail rideshare apps leave? [...] What's the name of the app you have here? "Overshare"? My God, that is so on-the-nose it's almost Dickensian. Take the bus. 
The Wild Storm #9 is an issue of the series The Wild Storm (Volume 1) with a cover date of January, 2018. It was published on November 15, 2017.
Synopsis for "The Wild Storm - Chapter Nine"
Jacob Marlowe and Adrianna Tereshkova have delivered Angie Spica to a space where Marlowe store their stuff. Marlowe explains that this warehouse of immense solitude has the security of a fortress, and part of that security is that he won't tell her where it is. Adrianna will act as a 'taxi' service, responding to a phone he hands Angie. Marlowe lists off the amenities, and then mentions that there is a field medic kit in one of the side rooms, which he assumes she will need. Marlowe offers to bring her a doctor, but Angie, toying with a pastel-colored pistol she found on a nearby table, says she will be fine.
At IO HQ, Mitch Saunders walks into Jackie King's office and lays out a story: a contractor named "Wilson Flowers" at the Hightower facility, who passed every background check, was caught hacking into the computers. He killed some of the guards, walked into a supply closet... and vanished. But the strangest thing is that his profile also vanished. They don't even have a picture now. Saunders wonders what he is becoming, that he can rattle off these facts without thinking of the families of the bereaved. Jackie muses at this, and then says she needs to talk to the director.
On the way to Miles Craven's office, she runs into Ivana Baiul, the Deputy Director, who questions her on the working group she has set up, but Jackie keeps her cool, and walks on. In Craven's office, she says that her research into Cole Cash lists him as working for something called "Project Thunderbook", which she can find nothing on. Craven says Project Thunderbook was classified Director's Eyes Only, and when Jackie objects, he specifies - it was classified as such by his predecessor, John Lynch.
Before he quit, Lynch destroyed the files on Project Thunderbook, and also a bunch of the staff committed suicide. And also three of their buildings burned down. Thunderbook is a locked box, but Jackie says she will look into it. Craven asks what about the purpose of her new working group. Jackie tries to stonewall, but eventually confesses that she is wargaming a method of hacking into Skywatch's computers. Craven orders her not to do anything without consulting him.
It is raining on Brooklyn, which makes John Colt pause as he puts on his suit, and remember another time, when he confronted a group of warriors in 17th century Japan. With a mix of sword skill and superhuman power, he had cut his way through the group, only for the driver to remark that if he had asked, he would have given him the thing he's transporting.
In the back of the wagon, John had found a piece of nonhuman technology, and cursed someone named Emp who had clumsily stored it under his bed.
In the present, Kenesha calls John to go over their plans for Hightower. John wonders aloud if there is any champagne in the house, which irritates Kenesha, who fires back that they have lived through times when clean running water was a luxury. Coldly, John points out the class difference between the two of them: Kenesha, with her three-syllable name, honored as a savant, selected to serve on the expedition led by Emp, who was so important he had a one-syllable name. John, meanwhile, was a frontline grunt with an eight-syllable name, marked as an "individual of no value". At home, he would never be allowed near the luxury that champagne and fine suits represents in New York, which is why he intends to indulge himself. Kenesha remarks that between one-syllable rulers and three-syllable savants, there are two-syllable names like "Zannah".
Across town, in the Skywatch Ground Division office, Lucy Blaze is looking out the window when she gets a call from Lauren Pennington, who is speaking on behalf of Director Bendix. Pennington orders her to prioritize the exosuit case[1]. Lucy asks why, and though Pennington initially bridles at even being asked, she admits that Bendix believes the exosuit case will reveal that IO has stolen Skywatch hardware, and she is to watch IO's Analysis section for leads on who they need to blame.
At the end of the workday at IO, Jackie is waiting for the bus when she sees Mitch using a rideshare app. Jackie pulls him aside and tries to lecture him on the terrible operation security that apps represent. Mitch gets defensive - he acknowledges that she is right, but says that he spends his days doing a job he cannot tell anyone about, working to help IO control and create the real world. He wants to feel normal. And in the world IO has created, rideshare apps are normal. Jackie asks him to think about security, and then catches the bus. Feeling adrift, Mitch opens a dating app.
At the warehouse, Angie has taken the medical kit and set up an intravenous drip via a stent she grew around the peripheral veins in her left hand. Picking up the pastel-colored pistol, she muses that it is time to learn about guns...
Appearing in "The Wild Storm - Chapter Nine"
Featured Characters:
- Jacklyn King
- Angie Spica
- John Colt
Supporting Characters:
Villains:
- Skywatch
- Henry Bendix (Mentioned)
- Lauren Pennington
- International Operations
- Miles Craven
- Ivana Baiul
Other Characters:
Locations:
- Jacob Marlowe's Secret Warehouse
- New York City
- Japan (Flashback only)
Items:
Vehicles:
Notes
- Jacob Marlowe refers to his warehouse hideout, variously, as a "loot crate", and a "money bin"
- "Money bin" is a reference to Duck Tales, a cartoon from the late Eighties, starring a rich character, Scrooge McDuck, who kept all his money in an unsorted mass in an iconic vault, and would sometimes swim around in it.
- "Loot crate" may be a reference to "loot boxes", a practice in video games of paying money for a set of consumable virtual items, which rose in ubiquity in the late 2010s, or to Loot Crate, a subscription service from the same period, which would send subscribers a box of branded tchotchkes on a monthly cycle.
- In his office, Miles Craven is reading "Against The Day", by Thomas Pynchon.
See Also