Family of Secrets - Part 3
Amy shoved the laptop into her bag and made her way to the ARC, wanting to apologise to her father, and maybe the panicked-laptop owner who probably sat, sullen and silent, in her dad’s office about to have the sack. She’d overreacted, and it wasn’t the first time, but now she was going to set things straight.
She reached the front gates where the soldiers sat in their box, sheltering from the rain. She pressed a button on the intercom, addressing the men, and telling them she was here to see her father.
Before long the voice of her father echoed through the intercom from his dry office. “Amelia, what is it? We’ve got ourselves in a bit of a situation so if you could hurry…”
“I need to talk to you dad.”
“What, now?!” Her father’s cold voice almost squeaked. “Didn’t you hear me? We’ve got a situation.”
“So have I…”
“Can’t it be said over this?”
She let out a sigh. “Doesn’t matter. I just wanted to apologise...”
“For what?” Even though the words assumed he was interested in what she had to say she still had a feeling he might’ve been talking to someone else, that he didn’t care that she was standing in the rain and about to empty her heart out across an intercom.
“I stole a laptop, the other day. One of yours. I came to gave it back.”
She also had two drinks in her hand. One was a cappuccino, two sugars, full fat milk and a squirt of cream beneath the lid while hers was a hot chocolate, the marshmallows dissolving in the boiling drink as she talked.
“You…?” He let out another sigh and she could imagine him massaging the arc of his nose. “Yes, well, give it to one of the soldiers will you? They’ll sort it out.”
“…Okay…”
With another exasperated sigh her father’s intercom clicked off, and she was left standing in the rain. She turned towards the soldiers and knocked on the window of their box.
“Here. Can you tell James Lester that it might be a bit cold…? And tell him it’s from his daughter.”
“Will do.” The soldier left the box with his hand hugging the cup almost immediately, probably scared of disobeying Lester’s daughter.
Amy gave a quick glance towards the grey building that almost camouflaged with the grey horizon. It sat across an empty warehouse of some sort, both in contrast with each other, as she was with her father. The laptop still lay, untouched, in her bag, the rain slowly seeping through the fabric.
The excuse was just to make her feel better, lying to herself that she was sheltering from the rain, and not actually about to do the one thing that would make her dad listen. One thing she wouldn’t apologise for later because every time she tried she came to hate her father even more.
In a couple of minutes the laptop lay open in a dank room of the warehouse.
*
“Okay…” Connor blurted, trying to make sense of what he was seeing on the screen. “Okay…Okay, okay… Uh…” He glanced over his shoulder, registering everyone around him, trying to spot a missing member of staff, anything that would make sense.
“What’s up?” Abby placed both of her hands on his shoulders before snatching them off, remembering that all eyes were on Connor, and they hadn’t quite told anyone they were going out, yet.
“I don’t get it…” He shook his head in disbelief, leaning back against his chair, his hands slumping beside him before his head fell forward against the desk. “There’s two…”
“Two?” Abby echoed.
“Yes, two hackers.” Connor rubbed his eyes with his gloved hands before returning his weary eyes to the screen. “Apparently, this new hacker is using one of the ARC’s laptops to interfere with our systems…”
“So, what, they’re using our own weapons against us?” Danny stepped forward from the small crowd.
“A laptop is hardly a weapon, is it?” Becker interjected, Connor lifting his head at the mockery.
“Okay, one, Danny, yes they are. Two, Becker, you’ve never had someone slam your fingers in one, so quiet.” Becker’s eyes widened at the order. “Please…”
“So what do we do?” Danny turned to their boss. “Lester?”
“Sorry, what?” Lester was leaning against one of his tables, a finger curling over his mouth as he stared at the floor intently. “Yes, go ahead.”
“Go ahead with what?” Danny asked, frowning.
“The plan.”
“What plan?”
“Exactly, Temple, what plan?” It was as if Lester had been sleeping and someone had thrown a glass of water on him, he’d sprung into action and Connor was faced with the onslaught, again.
“That’s what we… uh… what?”
“I have a headache, can you handle this one?” Lester asked Danny who mirrored Connor’s confused frown before nodding. “I’ll be up in my office…”
They watched silently as their boss walked up the ramp and shut the door quietly behind him. Danny ran a hand through his hair before clicking his tongue. “Okay, Connor, can you trace the laptop?”
“I dunno… Laptops don’t tend to send out signals… Although, if they’re connected to the internet, which they probably are, I could use the IP address, unless they’re in the ARC…”
“Becker, get your men ready, we need to turn the ARC inside out, if they’re hacking from an ARC laptop, then maybe they’re here. And… trust no one…” Danny gave the man a single nod before he ran for the artillery they needed.
“Why would they hack from inside the ARC? That’s just plain stupid.” Abby commented.
“Maybe they’re plain stupid.”
“They’re playing games with us, Danny… They’re not actually doing anything… They’re just there.”
Danny turned to face the screen. “Hmm. How would you explain that?”
Everyone fell silent, just watching. Connor felt almost too scared to turn in his chair and look up towards the screen just to see what had silenced everyone. He had to lean back against his chair in order to see them properly, and before they even spoke Connor knew they were trouble.
“Ah, the Anomaly Research Centre. And how are we all today?” He didn’t recognise the man, his long, sturdy face, or his cold voice. “Good start to the day, was it? Save a few lives here and there, nothing much…”
Connor could hear the footsteps of the armed personnel of the ARC rushing through the corridors, forcing doors open. A thought occurred to him, there were two hackers, and just the one controlled from an ARC laptop…a laptop that didn’t have a webcam but seemed to be operating video communications.
He glanced towards the top of the ADD screens and saw that he was not on their video feed as he sat right beneath the stands, and he turned to Danny who seemed almost mesmerised by the whole thing.
“It’s a distraction…” Connor mouthed, pointing towards the man on the screen. “It’s a distraction!” He waved his arms and finally got Danny’s attention. “They. Are. A. Distraction.”
“Good old Danny Quinn, the police force got too much for ya, did it? The pay wasn’t good enough, eh?” Danny headed towards Connor, circling the ADD to be out of view. “Oh, where are you off to?”
“What?” Danny whispered, towards Connor.
“I said, they were a distraction… They’re not hacking anything, they’re just communicating, the other one’s going after the files…”
“Which other one?”
“The ARC laptop…”
“How do you know these people aren’t the laptop people…?”
“The ARC laptops don’t have webcams. If they did someone could easily hack them and watch our every step.”
“Okay… So, what do we do?”
“I’m gonna trace them both. Find their IP addresses, and with that I can use the ADD to detect the output of the computers, we’ll stop them before they delete the whole system, hopefully.”
“What if we don’t?”
“Then, we’ll be lined up against the wall and Lester will shoot every single one of us.”
“Lester!” Danny clapped his hands. “Go and inform Lester.”
“Okay.”
At that Connor left and headed for the ramp. A solider stood by Lester’s desk, a cup in his hand as Lester sat in his leather chair, massaging his temples. He glanced towards Danny who’d gone through a fire exit in order to contact and inform Becker of their current situation.
“Lester, we have a situation.” Connor said immediately after pushing the door open.
“There’s always a situation… Carry on.”
“Whoever’s hacking us is using one of the ARC’s laptops. I’m going to track it, find out where they’re situated, if not in the ARC, but did someone tell you we had a missing laptop?” Connor asked, his hands sweating as he rubbed the nervously against his jeans.
Lester’s face dropped, and he placed his elbows on the table, his head buried in his palms.
“Yeah. Yes, I know of a missing laptop…”
“Great! Who informed you?”
“My daughter.”
“What?”
“Amelia, Amy, incomprehensible child of the year. She’d stolen a laptop from here the other day after our situation. But apart from that, no, I don’t know of ant stolen or missing laptops because our staff don’t tend to steal what they can afford.” Lester was almost shouting, his hands clenched into fists in anger.
Connor didn’t need to say or ask anything else; he simply turned and ran down the ramp. He slowed as he came to the ADD and snuck back into his chair.
“Ah, Connor Temple has joined us, has he not?”
He ignored the man on the screen, knowing that if they found out someone else was trying to hack their targets at the same time she’d be at trouble. Danny came up to him again, asking questions about what he was doing but he just ignored them, trying to concentrate on what he was to type onto the computer in order to stop both hacking, or at least Amy’s.
Connor ran a shaking hand through his hair, unsure of what to do, how he would stop two. His hands lowered towards the keyboard, ready to type in various commands just as the screen went black and a burst of static escaped the speakers.
“Shit.”
*
A burst of static escaped the laptop’s speakers as she struggled to find the mute button. She’d accidentally closed their video programme, whoever they were, and now sat in darkness as the white noise escaped the laptop.
As her ears adjusted to the constant sound she could hear alarmed voices from the corridor outside. Her palms pressed against the speakers, the noise becoming nothing more than a hum beneath her hands but it still wasn’t enough to hide the fact that she was there.
Amy watched intently as the shadows beneath the door blocked the entire strip of light. She watched as the handle was turned. She closed the laptop and lifted it high above her head.
“Get on the floor now!” Was the order as someone rammed the door, Amy suddenly jumping towards the man and striking the laptop against his head. It wasn’t enough so she lifted it, ready to strike again.
There was a single gunshot.
*