Blackout

by Peter Jay Black

  For an agonising minute or so, nothing happened and the room filled up with more of the acrid fumes. It stung Jack’s eyes and he squinted up at the fire alarm.

  Was it even working?

  He could barely see the blinking red LED now.

  Jack and Charlie both started coughing.

  Finally, just when Jack thought he was going to pass out, the alarm sounded, piercing the quietness.

  He heard the guard swear loudly outside the door and fumble with a set of keys.

  Jack felt dizzy and had to steady himself against the wall.

  Charlie grabbed two bottles of washing-up liquid from the shelf and tossed one to him.

  Jack frowned at it. ‘What’s this for?’

  The door opened and Charlie burst through, knocking the guard aside, catching him off balance.

  Jack ran after her, chucked the cloth away and bent double, coughing and gasping for air.

  Surprised, the guard staggered back as the fumes billowed into the hallway. ‘What have you two done?’

  Without a word, Charlie scooped her bag up off the floor and ran.

  Jack stood stunned for a second, then grabbed his own bag and sprinted after her, with the guard hard on his heels.

  ‘Stop!’

  When Jack caught up with Charlie, she popped the lid off the washing-up liquid and squirted it on to the floor behind them.

  Jack immediately did the same and they took a right, sprinting down another corridor.

  There was a shout of pain.

  Jack glanced back.

  The guard had tried to round the corner, but had slammed into the opposite wall. He was now struggling to get his balance. He tried to run after them, but fell flat on his back and let out another roar.

  Jack and Charlie carried on running until they reached a T-junction.

  ‘Which way?’ Charlie said.

  They had to go back and grab the USB drive from the computer room.

  Jack visualised the floor plan of the power station in his mind. ‘Left.’ He glanced at her. ‘I think.’

  They hurried off in that direction, moving as fast as they could. They didn’t want to get caught a second time.

  Finally, they reached the computer room and sneaked inside. The program must have worked and the virus was on Jack’s USB drive.

  Jack’s feet slipped. He looked down. ‘Why’s the floor wet in here?’

  ‘Probably from the guards’ boots.’ Charlie hurried over to the terminal. ‘No.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Jack said.

  She pointed at the empty USB slot. ‘Where is it?’

  Jack’s breath caught. ‘I left it there.’ He glanced up at the camera in the corner of the room. Could Obi see them? ‘The guards,’ he said. ‘They must have taken it.’ Jack hurried over to the terminal and started to type. ‘The virus has definitely gone from their system.’

  Charlie frowned. ‘Which means it’s on your drive, right? We need to find out what they’ve done with it.’

  They heard shouts coming from down the corridor.

  ‘We have to go,’ Jack said. He plugged the network cable into the back of the terminal and made a mental note of the IP address.

  They then both crept into the hallway.

  The shouting was coming from their left. Jack and Charlie ran right, following the twists and turns of the corridor, up the steps, and back outside.

  As they sprinted to the fence, Jack glanced up.

  The guard was still hanging out of the window and his cold eyes followed them.

  Slink held the wire on the fence open and Wren was already climbing into the sub.

  Charlie ducked through the hole.

  ‘We heard the alarms and shouting,’ Slink said. ‘What happened?’

  The emergency-exit door banged open and the two guards and night duty manager ran outside. They stopped and looked around.

  ‘Let’s get out of here.’ Jack ducked through the fence and gestured for Charlie and Slink to get into the submarine.

  As they clambered through Stingray’s hatch, the night duty manager caught sight of Jack and for a second he seemed puzzled. It was probably the first time he’d seen a mini submarine bobbing on the surface of the River Thames.

  He quickly came to his senses, however, and started running towards the fence. ‘There,’ he shouted at the guards.

  Jack swung his legs over the hole and dropped into the sub. He closed the hatch, spun the wheel and sat down.

  There was a sudden loud thunk above them.

  ‘What was that?’ Wren said.

  Charlie pressed her eyes to the periscope. ‘That dozy idiot has just jumped onboard.’ Her fingers moved over the controls.

  There was a squeak above Jack’s head. He looked up and gasped – the wheel to the hatch was turning. Jack grabbed hold of it. ‘Quick, Charlie.’

  ‘Diving.’

  Jack struggled to keep the hatch secured. The wheel moved a couple of centimetres as the man above fought to undo it. ‘Hurry up.’ Jack’s arms strained as the wheel turned a few more centi­metres. The guy was too strong for him.

  Suddenly, the pressure on the wheel eased and Jack secured it back into place.

  ‘It’s OK,’ Charlie said, looking through the periscope. ‘He’s gone for a swim.’

  As they dived to the bottom of the Thames, Jack spoke into his headset. ‘Obi, can you hear us now?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Please tell me you recorded all the CCTV cameras?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Jack let out a small breath. He could always rely on Obi. ‘And you’ve got a recording for the computer room?’

  ‘Yeah, I’ve got it.’

  ‘Great,’ Jack said. ‘I want you to watch that recording from the moment Charlie and I went in there.’

  ‘I don’t need to,’ Obi said. ‘I was watching it all happen.’

  There was something about Obi’s voice that was unsettling.

  ‘So,’ Jack said. ‘What did happen?’

  ‘Just come home,’ Obi said. ‘I’ll get the recordings ready for you.’

  Jack didn’t like the sound of that.

  An hour and a half later, they were back in the bunker.

  Jack hurried over to Obi. ‘Any idea which one of the guards took my USB stick?’

  Obi nodded. ‘Yeah. None of them.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Obi clicked on the screen. ‘It wasn’t a guard that found it.’ He brought up an image of the computer room and sped the recording forward.

  Jack watched as he and Charlie entered, plugged in the USB stick, then were caught and escorted out by the guards.

  Obi fast-forwarded a couple more minutes and paused it. ‘Watch this.’ He hit play.

  The time and date counter ticked off in the corner of the screen.

  The lights in the room periodically went off and on.

  The door to the computer room opened and a hooded figure stepped inside.

  ‘Who’s that?’ Slink said.

  The person lowered their hood, glanced up at the camera and they all got a clear look at his face. He was a boy, no older than Jack and Charlie – fourteen, maybe fifteen. He had an olive complexion, with dark, almost black, hair, and he wore a backpack.

  Charlie leant into the display. ‘He looks like one of us.’

  ‘Why’s he wet?’ Wren said.

  She was right – the kid’s clothes were dripping water all over the floor.

  Charlie glanced at Jack, but she didn’t need to say anything.

  He nodded – the floor had been wet when they went back to retrieve the USB stick.

  The kid moved to the computer terminal, typed something in, then reached over and pulled out the USB drive. After examining it for a moment, he undid his jacket and slid it into an inner pocket.

  ‘Little thief,’ Slink said.

  The kid glanced around and left the server room.

  Jack looked at the time on the screen. It had taken the kid le
ss than a minute to steal their drive. He sighed. ‘Looks like someone had the same idea as us.’

  Obi scanned through the recordings and found one from the camera on the other side of the Thames.

  The five of them watched the monitor.

  ‘There,’ Jack said, pointing.

  The water rippled by the submarine and a head popped up. For a while, it bobbed there, obviously assessing the situation.

  Obi zoomed the image in the best he could. ‘He’s wearing a mask and snorkel.’

  ‘Guess he also had a wetsuit on under his clothes,’ Charlie said. ‘How did he not drown? The current is –’

  ‘Look,’ Wren said.

  They all leant into the screen as Obi paused the image.

  ‘What is that?’ Slink said.

  The kid was gripping on to a black cylinder about half a metre in length.

  Charlie made a sound somewhere between a gasp and a squeak. ‘I’ve always wanted one of those.’

  ‘What is it?’ Obi said.

  ‘A DPV. They’re amazing. Cost a fortune.’

  ‘What’s a DPV?’

  ‘A Diver Propulsion Vehicle.’ Noticing everyone’s blank expressions, Charlie continued. ‘It’s like an underwater scooter. Divers use it to get around. It has a motor that drags you along.’

  ‘What’s the range?’ Jack said.

  Charlie shrugged. ‘Depends on the model. Two or three miles.’

  ‘So, he could’ve come from anywhere.’ Jack looked at the main display as Obi hit the Play button again.

  The kid stopped next to the submarine, pulled himself out of the water and slipped through the hole in the fence they’d cut.

  He crouched down, slipped off his mask and snorkel, and tucked them into his backpack.

  He glanced at the submarine, then up at the tower.

  ‘Now he’s seen you two,’ Obi said to Slink and Wren. ‘How did you not spot him?’

  As if in answer, the kid pulled up his hood and sprang forward. Keeping low, he sprinted to the base of the tower.

  ‘He’s fast,’ Charlie said.

  Slink crossed his arms and muttered, ‘Not that fast.’

  The kid waited there a second, with his back pressed against the wall, then, with another quick look around, he sprinted to the emergency exit, opened the door and went inside the building.

  Obi brought up another file that showed the camera view from the hallway and matched the time stamp. ‘Watch between the blackouts,’ he said, and hit Play.

  The kid took a few steps into the corridor, pulled a device from his bag and pressed it high on the wall.

  ‘That’s when I saw him and tried to tell you,’ Obi said.

  ‘When we were in the computer room.’ Jack frowned at the kid’s device, then looked at Charlie. ‘Phone signal blocker?’

  She nodded.

  The image went dark, and when it came back on again, the kid was gone.

  ‘I’ll show you what happened when he left.’ Obi opened another recording and they watched the kid run back out of the building, past the guard tower and stop at the fence. He put on his mask and snorkel, ducked through the hole and slipped beneath the surface of the water.

  ‘Obi, can you go back to the time he was in the computer room?’ Jack said. ‘I want to see something.’

  Obi clicked the trackerball and the recording appeared on the screen.

  Jack leant in, watching as the kid typed.

  ‘There’s no way we can tell what he’s typing,’ Obi said.

  ‘There is a way.’ Jack pointed. ‘Look at his fingers.’

  If they were lucky, they’d be able to work out what keys he was pressing.

  ‘Is that a “Q”?’ Wren asked.

  ‘No,’ Obi said. ‘It’s numbers. I’m sure of it.’

  Jack nodded as he watched. Obi sped the recording back and then forward again. He was right – the kid was definitely typing numbers.

  Suddenly, it dawned on Jack. ‘It’s an IP address,’ he said. ‘The kid was checking the computers, looking for the virus. See?’ He pointed at the kid as he stopped typing. ‘Now he realises it’s transferred to my USB stick.’

  Sure enough – the kid removed it and slid it into his pocket.

  ‘So,’ Obi said, ‘he has the virus now?’

  Jack straightened up. ‘Yep. We need to find him, get the virus and put an end to this.’ He took the keyboard from Obi and set to work.

  ‘Let’s give Jack some space.’ Charlie signalled to Slink and Wren, and the three of them walked to the kitchen to make snacks.

  First, Jack checked Bransgore’s computers were connected to the internet again. They were, so he hacked into them and opened the logs. The records showed the kid had first looked in the main system for the virus, then followed the path to Jack’s USB drive. Jack was impressed – the kid knew what he was doing.

  But he’d made one mistake – he’d taken Jack’s program with him, not just the virus, but the whole thing.

  In every piece of code Jack wrote, he included a homing beacon in case it was stolen. It was a way for Jack to locate and recover his own software, should anything like this happen.

  The homing beacon broadcast a unique fingerprint that Jack could use to track it.

  He set a trace program running, but had no way of knowing how long it would take for the kid to plug the USB drive into a computer that was connected to the internet.

  Jack handed the keyboard back to Obi and sighed. Now it was only a matter of time. He just hoped they caught up with the kid before the virus escaped again.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The next morning, Jack was leaning against Obi’s chair, with the keyboard and tracker­ball pulled towards him as he stared at the screen. Every hour he’d woken up and come to check to see if his program had traced the kid. This time, he decided to stay and work on something else while he waited.

  The door behind Jack opened and Obi waddled in, rubbing his eyes. ‘Have you been up all night?’

  Jack yawned. ‘Most of it.’

  Obi climbed into his chair. ‘What’s that?’ He pointed at a series of seemingly random letters and numbers on the screen.

  ‘It’s called Kryptos.’

  ‘Some sort of secret code?’ Obi asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And you’ve cracked it?’

  ‘Maybe, I don’t know.’ Jack closed a few of the windows and pushed the keyboard and trackerball to Obi. ‘It seems to start with, “All free men”. But, I haven’t finished the –’

  Suddenly, there was a beeping sound.

  ‘No way,’ Jack said. ‘That’s just typical.’

  Obi clicked the trackerball. ‘It’s the trace program. We’ve got him.’

  Jack took the keyboard back from Obi and typed. After checking and rechecking where the signal was coming from, he said, ‘Can you call the others?’

  A minute later, Charlie rushed over, followed by Slink and Wren. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘We’ve found the kid.’ Jack spun the monitor round so they could all see it. It showed a map of London with a blinking red dot over a building next to Covent Garden. ‘He’s there.’

  They all leant in for a better look.

  Charlie frowned. ‘Jack, are you sure that’s right?’

  ‘Positive. Now watch this.’ Jack hacked straight into the kid’s computer and opened his email account. ‘His name’s Hector.’

  ‘Guess he’s a hacker too,’ Slink said.

  Jack nodded. ‘He seems pretty good at it. His IP and MAC addresses are well masked, and he’s using several proxies. Unfortunately for him, my program’s beacon cut right through all his defences.’

  ‘I’ve seen that name before,’ Obi said. ‘He was on the Cerberus forum a while back. He’s the guy that hacked into that supermarket computer and changed all their prices.’ Obi looked at Jack. ‘You remember? Everything in the shop cost a penny?’

  ‘Bet you loved that,’ Slink said.

  Obi scowled at
him and continued, ‘It caused mayhem – hundreds of people swamped their stores trying to buy cheap stuff. They had to call the police and everything.’

  Jack stared at the screen. ‘Who knows what this Hector kid has planned for the virus then.’ He reached over, clicked on the blinking red dot and brought up a street view of the road. The signal was coming from an apartment block. ‘Look at the door.’

  The front door was made of reinforced glass.

  ‘That’s got a Deadsight Three-Twelve lock.’ Charlie leant over Obi’s chair and spun the view left and right. The road was packed full of people. It was a busy part of London. ‘There’s no way to pick the lock without being spotted.’ She straightened up and looked at Jack. ‘Which means we’ll need to use the gun.’

  Jack stepped back, thinking. ‘Yep.’

  ‘So,’ Charlie said. ‘What’s the plan? If we’re using the gun, we’ll need a distraction. Can’t risk someone seeing it.’

  Jack thought about it for a moment. ‘We have to go now,’ he said. ‘That leaves us with only one solution.’

  ‘Oh, wait a minute.’ Slink’s face lit up in realisation. ‘Are you – are you saying . . .’

  Jack nodded.

  ‘Yes.’ Slink punched the air. ‘This month has been amazing. So much fun. And now we get to do The Phoenix?’ He skipped in a circle like an excited four-year-old. ‘I freakin love The Phoenix.’

  Wren frowned at him. ‘What’s The Phoenix?’

  ‘It’s something we use whenever we don’t have time to organise a proper mission,’ Jack said. ‘It’s a form of distraction.’

  ‘It’s a last resort,’ Charlie corrected.

  Wren looked at Jack. ‘Can I come with you?’

  ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘You’re going to be a key part of this.’ His gaze moved to the clock on the main display. ‘Be ready to go in ten minutes.’

  Slink ran down the corridor to his room and shouted, ‘This is going to be epic.’

  ‘We need equipment.’ Charlie gestured for Wren to follow her to the workshop.

  Jack said to Obi, ‘Run a check on this Hector kid. Find out everything you can.’

  ‘Sure. Hey, Jack, you remember the last two times we tried The Phoenix, don’t you?’

  ‘Yep.’

  Obi frowned. ‘But, it didn’t work, either time. Took us weeks to clean up the mess it caused.’