Hacked

by Tracy Alexander

  I started at Pay As You Go, but he meant the beginning as in Adam and Eve. I whizzed through my childhood, highlighting, as he suggested, anything that could help my case. He liked the ADHD. He liked the Robin Hood angle too – stealing from the rich phone company to help the poor Soraya who shared a computer, and her friend Mia with the wicked mother.

  ‘Detail, Dan. That’s what I need.’

  Detail, he got. I got some gen on him too. He knew Dad from the terraces. Never thought you met sharp-talking solicitors down at the Ashton Gate stadium!

  Going back into an interview session with Charlie Tate by my side was like having a fairy godmother. He did all the talking, which suited me fine – I was bored with my own voice saying the same things. My new job was strictly ‘no comment’.

  Having listened to their questions for maybe an hour and given nothing back, Charlie announced, ‘If you’re serious about holding a sixteen-year-old savant on terror charges we need to see some substance behind the woolly allegations you’re bandying around.’

  I wasn’t sure I liked the use of the word ‘savant’ – didn’t that mean stratospherically clever at one thing and a dodo at everything else? Actually, maybe that was good …

  The fatter interrogator said, ‘Mr Tate, with respect, your client has admitted culpability in a previous interview —’

  ‘An admission that I will have thrown out based on his clear lack of understanding as to the implications of his act. Dan may be a gifted computer scientist but he is also a minor with a significant medical history.’ A pause, for theatrical purposes. ‘I suggest you let Dan go home, unless you’d like his predicament plastered over the front page of the Daily Mail on a slow news day.’

  Charlie stood up and motioned for me to do the same.

  ‘He will, of course, be happy to answer any further questions in my presence if the occasion arises.’

  Nice!

  38

  Charlie drove me back to Bristol in a silver Mercedes – shiny on the outside, more like my room on the inside. He didn’t tick me off, just chatted like we were mates. He said his wife was five months pregnant, so I shared the tips I’d picked up from Mum – like putting cushions under her belly for a comfortable sleep and drinking raspberry leaf tea when she’s due. He seemed to find my knowledge of childbirth hilarious. I told him about Ruby too, as he was my new BFF.

  ‘Don’t lose hope,’ he said. ‘When it comes to love, people generally don’t like what’s good for them. They like what they like.’

  I liked what I was hearing. Only the spectre of Dad, waiting for me with his disappointed face, sullied my mood.

  ‘Your dad’s going to meet us at the office,’ said Charlie. ‘He wanted to come, by the way, but I told him there was no point. Said I’d have you back from London in a jiffy.’ He grinned – Cheshire-Cat-style. ‘I’ll bring him up to speed and then you can get off home and we’ll see what happens next.’

  ‘What do you think will happen next?’

  Charlie turned to face me – not ideal when you’re in the fast lane on the M4.

  ‘They could harass you to prove a point, but given your willingness to help, I don’t see that there’s much mileage in that. Cyber crime is notoriously difficult to prosecute for all sorts of reasons.’

  ‘Like?’

  He puffed like a friendly dragon, eyes back on the road.

  ‘The law hasn’t caught up with the technology and never will, everyone’s doing it, most people don’t understand it, the evidence is either not there or incomprehensible, the internet is global but the law is most definitely local – that throws up jurisdiction issues and those alone could keep most cases in court indefinitely …’ He took both hands off the wheel and rubbed them together. ‘Great stuff for lawyers, though.’

  Ding!

  If Ruby ever spoke to me again and asked me what I wanted to be, I had a new answer. A lawyer, specialising in the deep, dark net … why not?

  ‘So they might or might not harass me. Want to put any odds on that?’ I asked.

  ‘Odds are they’ll leave you alone,’ said Charlie. ‘I’d put money on it. They wanted someone to kick, and without Angel, there was only you – a kid with a keyboard and no common sense. No offence!’

  ‘None taken,’ I said.

  I remember the feeling his words gave me. The sense that it was definitely over. As the last few miles sped by, I wondered whether I might even end up being thanked for my part in capturing the terrorist known as Angel.

  ‘Here we are.’

  Charlie’s office was in Queens Square. Dad was waiting in his car but got out as soon as we drew up.

  ‘Are you all right, Dan?’ he said. ‘We were so worried.’ Seeing me dragged off to London seemed, weirdly, to have made him more sympathetic.

  Charlie put an arm round both of us and swept us into the building. In ten minutes he’d covered everything, reassuring Dad, and even putting in a good word for me.

  ‘He’s a bright kid. We all make mistakes, but unlike footballers, who at most break a few windows, hackers can bring down whole buildings. He’s learnt his lesson.’ Big wink. ‘Can’t be easy having all this on his conscience.’

  I tried to look like I truly had learnt my lesson but actually my conscience didn’t know what to make of it all. Whenever there was a crisis like the heating breaking down on Christmas morning or lost luggage at the airport, my grandad always used to say, ‘Is anyone hurt?’ That was all that mattered. I got that. But as Angel didn’t get to fire the missiles, the only damage was to the drone. Whereas the US Military had mown down her grandma. The right and wrong of it wasn’t black and white. I kept my thoughts to myself.

  ‘I blame myself,’ said Dad. ‘We knew he was spending too much time on the computer but thought he was just gaming.’

  I let that slide, but we both knew the BMW’s mirrors didn’t hack themselves.

  ‘All kids spend too much time on the computer,’ said Charlie. ‘Actually, you might want to stay offline for now, Dan. I’m sure you’re aware of the extent of government surveillance operations … entirely unlawful.’

  Dad dropped me home, where Gran was waiting. When she saw us park, she came out with a bristly broom to sweep the pavement and ‘accidentally’ bashed the legs and tripods of all the press. (Actually very funny – like the woman in Tom and Jerry whose head you never see.)

  ‘You get back to work,’ she said to Dad. ‘I’ll look after this one.’

  Her bony arms gave me the biggest hug she could manage. ‘Sit down and I’ll make you a hot chocolate. Your mum’s having a nap. No need to disturb her.’

  She had a cup of tea and gave me her take on the situation, which was, in a nutshell: ‘They deserve everything they get. If a slip of a boy can break in to the computer that controls the aeroplanes, the Americans aren’t doing their job.’

  Followed by: ‘That drone won’t be killing any more grandmothers like me and that can’t be a bad thing. In the Express it said the poor woman was gardening!’

  Gran had conveniently forgotten the part of Angel’s plan that involved bombing London. She moved on to her favourite topic – the weather and its effect on her magnolia.

  That hour, sitting in the kitchen with Gran, was the eye of the storm, not that we knew it. We all thought the nightmare was over. But that’s the thing about storms – safe in the eye, you have no idea what’s coming at you …

  39

  Everyone got hassled – school friends, neighbours, even the Sunday volunteers. The Mail wanted an interview, which Mum and Dad refused. For the money they were offering, I’d have done it, but Charlie said it was a bad idea. Other people blabbed about us quite happily. It was a case study into how you can piece together a whole life from what’s freely available online and what strangers are willing to say, and get most of it wrong. I vowed to keep my future safe from social media, if I was ever allowed back on anything. Mum and Dad weren’t exactly falling over themselves to let me use the home computer and who
knew when mine would come winging back? It meant I could only read what was written about me in the paper – probably no bad thing.

  No one seemed to know much about Angel, except that she went off the rails soon after her grandma was killed. The house in Norfolk was owned by people who’d never heard of her, bought as an investment but left empty to be commandeered by Angel. She actually grew up in Buckingham, born to a Yemeni father and a Welsh mother. They looked nice, photographed at a wedding with some people in a sort of traditional dress, and others in mini-skirts. The only picture of Angel was in school uniform, blurred so that her white socks were the most noticeable feature. Rumours were that she’d left the country to go to a training camp for terrorists – but that was the likes of the Sun, so entirely made up. The Guardian’s article suggesting she’d been recruited by fanatics and ‘turned’ from a happy, intelligent child into a monster was more believable. (First thing every morning, none of it was believable – Dan Langley, accomplice to terrorists. Pinch me.)

  Joe was the first visitor brave enough to burrow under the blanket of paparazzi keeping the house warm. I wasn’t dressed, even though it was two in the afternoon. Couldn’t be bothered.

  ‘What the hell?’ he said, as he fought through the melee.

  ‘I’m a celebrity,’ I said. ‘The plane’s on its way to fly me to the jungle.’

  He gave a satisfyingly loud laugh – first I’d heard in a while.

  We went up to my room, leaving El and Mum (who was signed off work – no one wanted a baby delivered by the mother of a terrorist) making pancakes.

  ‘You all right?’ said Joe.

  ‘I suppose so – apart from being a prisoner in my own house.’

  ‘Better than in the nick … the police don’t want to charge you, then?’

  ‘With what?’ I said, and then, because I remembered he was my friend, not a journalist or parent or cop, I filled him in.

  ‘I didn’t technically break any British laws because the hack was overseas and the law’s fuzzy. And they believe me about not knowing what Angel was planning, so even though she got close, it doesn’t change anything …’ I shrugged. I was so bored with it all.

  ‘There are a lot of people who think she’s got a point,’ he said.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘People who blog … charities …’

  ‘I meant, who’s got a point?’

  ‘Angel, you idiot!’

  ‘Really?’ Gran thinking drones were evil and Americans were stupid and Angel’s grandma shouldn’t have been murdered was one thing, but other people agreeing …

  ‘Really.’ Joe gave me a knowing nod, worthy of the stage.

  ‘Tell me,’ I said.

  ‘There are groups against using automated drones, say they’re flying killer robots – they’re using Angel as an example of what could happen. Amnesty, some other human rights lot, even the United Nations, have come out with statements about “collateral damage” and “drone wars”. There are Afghanistanis —’

  ‘Afghans,’ I said.

  ‘That’s it. They’re posting numbers of … you know, normal people killed by the Americans and the British. The photo of Angel’s dead grandma has gone viral – it’s probably not her but … And there’s some motion or bill or something coming up in the House of Commons to stop unmanned drones flying wherever they like. It’s all kicked off, Dan.’

  ‘That was what Angel wanted,’ I said. ‘For people to give a damn about what happened to her family.’

  ‘Shame she picked you to help her.’

  ‘Tell me about it,’ I said.

  ‘Except if she hadn’t, no one would have stopped her. You’re the good guy,’ said Joe. ‘She’s the terrorist.’

  ‘It makes me sick thinking I was mates with someone who was really going to kill people. Even though I didn’t meet her face to face, I thought I knew her …’

  ‘You didn’t know she was a bird,’ he said, flapping his arms.

  I tried to look amused but it was too much effort. Most things were.

  ‘Have you seen Ruby?’ I heard myself ask, having promised I wasn’t going to.

  ‘No, but she rang Ty.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘She said she saw you being taken away. She was crying.’ He winced. ‘Said she didn’t want anything to do with you. Sorry, mate.’

  ‘Bet he didn’t stick up for me.’

  ‘You’re not exactly flavour of the month round there either,’ he said.

  Throughout all the ups and downs, I’d never felt as low. I’d felt more scared, but not so completely out of hope. It looked like I’d got away with it, but I was a marked man. Even though I was the one that owned up. What were the chances of ever leading a normal life? I wasn’t allowed back in school. They’d rung to say that I should stay at home and just come in for the exams. When Charlie called to see how I was he said, ‘Lots of kids go to college for sixth form,’ and, ‘You could always use your mum’s maiden name.’ It would be witness protection next …

  ‘Are you allowed to play anything?’ said Joe.

  ‘Like?’

  We ended up singing in the living room using El’s karaoke thing. It was the only offline option, apart from tennis! Bizarrely, it was fun. Especially our duet of ‘YMCA’. Mum came and watched. I could see she was pleased that I was out of bed and communicating.

  ‘Would you like to stay for tea, Joe?’ she asked.

  I think we both had pleading eyes.

  ‘Sure,’ he said.

  We had a pretty normal evening. Don’t underrate it. Normal was exactly what I wanted. But normal wasn’t going to last …

  The effect of that butterfly wing that fluttered way back when I was still keen on Soraya and Ty hadn’t been flattened and I’d never heard of Angel or kissed Ruby or met Charlie Tate … was silently gathering strength. There was nothing anyone could do. It was unstoppable. And I was its focus.

  Days went by. I stayed inside. We ate food. Courageous neighbours came to call. Judgemental neighbours didn’t. Dad fought his way to work. I revised, without Ty, which was less fun but at least gave me something to do. Actually, one day was different – the chickens arrived. El named hers Darcey Bussell, mine was Dronejacker, Mum’s was Heather and Dad’s, Chicken Tonight. Yep … side-splittingly funny!

  The press interest dwindled. One morning I looked out and there was no one on the doorstep. I pulled on my jeans and, without washing, eating or cleaning my teeth, ran outside, because I had a sudden fear that I might have become agoraphobic. I crossed the road and walked to the junction with Coldharbour Road. Phew! Entirely not afraid to leave the house. A few net curtains twitched as I passed.

  Terrorist on the loose!

  Lock up your children!

  I can’t say life returned to how it was before, but my moment of global fame was over. I hung out with Joe, tried to call Ty but got no answer, or reply to my texts. I saw him at the climbing centre when I went to watch Joe competing but he stood well away from me and disappeared straight afterwards. I didn’t bother with Ruby. I knew I’d see her when the exams started. That would have to do. Aiden came round with his geography books, and again with maths. Helping him helped me too. I’d changed my mind about As, I needed A*s. The lawyer idea had taken hold. I’d found out what grades you need and the A-levels to choose but, having nearly wrecked it, didn’t dare mention the future. Mum didn’t go back to work. No one uttered the word ‘depression’ but …

  Inspector Janes gave me my computers back, together with a lecture about how lucky I was to get off without charges and a warning to resist the temptation to ‘fiddle’. As instructed, I restricted my activity to playing and browsing, knowing I was on a list somewhere of people to watch. Late at night I found myself reading everything there was about cyber crime:

  If cyber crime was a disease, the government would have to announce a state of emergency … – BBC

  … everyone’s doing it … torrenting a film on Saturday night, that’s cyber crime –
random blogger

  … convicted computer hackers could be recruited to help fight cyber crime – the Defence Secretary (virtually offering me a job).

  Not that I’d work for government. I’d read enough about cover-ups, mass surveillance and what’s done to whistleblowers to know whose side I was on.

  40

  Easter Monday was sun sun sunny. The chickens laid their first eggs – well Darcey and Heather did, the other two were protesting at their names. Dad and I collided at breakfast. Mum had gone to the supermarket with El.

  ‘All right, Dan?’ he said.

  I was managing the absorption of my third Weetabix, gunning for a dry bowl.

  ‘Fine,’ I said.

  ‘We’re impressed, your mum and I, at how you’ve handled it.’ He looked very earnest.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said.

  ‘Working hard for your exams is the best thing you could be doing … but you could still go volunteering.’

  ‘As if!’ I didn’t mean to say that out loud.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Nothing,’ was what I meant to say, but the Confessional Tourette’s was back and this time it was in control.

  ‘Ruby doesn’t want to see me, and none of the old codgers will talk to me now I’m a terrorist.’

  Dad stuttered a bit, as unused to me saying how it really was as I was to saying it.

  ‘You’re not a terrorist. No one’s pressing charges. It was a mistake. A stupid, irresponsible act. Your friends will see that, once the fuss is over.’

  ‘Friends like Ty, you mean?’ My tone was aggressive. I wanted to stop but the genie was out of the lamp.

  ‘What’s going on with him, then?’

  ‘Have you seen him lately?’ I asked. ‘Have you noticed him popping round to see how I’m doing?’

  That got Dad fired up too.

  ‘Are you saying you’ve fallen out? Your best mate from —’

  ‘If blanking you is falling out, then yes, we’ve fallen out. Big time.’