In the Heat of the Light

by Stephen Kearse

  Tilly contemplated the Sims case. They’d been assigned to Sims after he’d jacked an old Lexus from an Atlanta councilwoman’s son. He should have been brought in by Atlanta’s finest, but Houndum finessed his way into getting the investigation picked up by the FBI and insisted that they build a huge case against him. “Free publicity,” he’d written in the subject line of the email assigning the case. #FireandBrimStoneMountain was certainly better publicity, and thus a better promotion, but it wasn’t like Rick to leave a case open or to make mistakes, even for a better case. He must be really stressed, Tilly concluded.

  She sat down at her desk and studied her face in her pocket mirror. She was definitely stressed, but she looked better than she’d expected. Black don’t crack, but it damn sure stretches, she thought, chuckling to herself. The sight of her smile made her pause. She hadn’t seen it in a while; it was almost unfamiliar.

  Ready for sleep, Tilly retrieved her groceries and headed for her car, dwelling on the odd surprise of having forgotten what she looked like when she smiled. As she drove home, she wondered how it would feel to completely forget, her mind electrified by the possibility.

  Tilly was lost after three turns. The Georgia Cybersecurity Command Center was a simple building—clear sight lines, long corridors, large, sun-seeking windows—but it had the soul of a labyrinth. Its every element encouraged paranoia. The walls were blindingly white, the artwork was unmemorable, the rooms weren’t numbered, the people ducked their heads. It was as if the entire building was one continuous surface, expanding in all directions yet leading nowhere, an architectural koan. Rick’s tacky Nikes, a schlocky, ectoplasmic green, were the only object in her field of vision that had definite shape, but even they were becoming an indistinct blur as their escort—he hadn’t told them his name—led them deeper into the atrium of the complex.

  After more turns and two card swipes, they eventually turned into an unremarkable room filled with overflowing binders stuffed onto dusty metal shelves. None of the binders were labeled, but nothing seemed out of place. The room had the clutter of a janitor’s closet and the organization of an evidence locker. Tilly and Rick watched silently as their escort sifted through the stacks and then removed five heavy binders, struggling to transfer them to a nearby desk. “No,” he barked when Rick attempted to help him with the load. “You can only access these documents through me, and that includes touching them.”

  “I hope that doesn’t mean we’ll be holding hands,” Rick joked. The escort didn’t laugh.

  “Why all the secrecy?” Tilly asked.

  Both the escort and Rick glared at her. Because it’s the NSA, dummy, she answered flatly in her head.

  “Because most Americans don’t like the idea of their government keeping files on teenagers,” the escort said. “But most Americans don’t know what some teenagers are up to, so managing that disconnect is up to us. And I mean us, not the CIA, or the DoD, or the press, or the FBI. No offense.”

  Tilly sighed as quietly as she could. “So, now that we’re in this room,” Rick said, “‘we’ as in my partner and I, and you, no offense, what can you tell us? And why the fuck do you still keep paper files?”

  “We keep paper files because Russia doesn’t tend to hack into doors. And I can tell you about five possible perps who we have been following in the Atlanta region who might have committed the attack you’re investigating.” Stiffly, he began opening the binders and spreading their contents over the desk. A sea of photographs and printed computer screenshots quickly drifted across the desk. Tilly wasn’t sure where to begin.

  The escort took the lead. “So, these two fit the standard profile for teen cybercrime in Georgia,” he began, gesturing at two printed portraits, both featuring names in bold print in the white space: Trevor Jenkins and Kurt Peters. “White, male, Libertarian, agnostic, decent grades. Forgettable in the real world, but menaces online. It’s mostly petty stuff. Spamming teachers they don’t like, distributing nude photographs of former girlfriends. Basically trolling gone a little too far. Good kids who need some guidance. “This one”—he jabbed his finger onto the asymmetrical nose of Trevor Jenkins—“could probably go to MIT if he just applied himself. Perfect SAT scores. He’ll probably just end up at GT, though.”

  “I think you’re taking this Big Brother thing too literally,” Rick replied. Tilly kept her eyes on the escort’s finger, afraid to meet Rick’s conspiring eyes and erupt into laughter.

  “So, are they our perps?” Tilly asked, still looking down.

  “Probably not,” the escort stammered. “Like I said, these two are trolls. Everything they do is to stoke a specific reaction, namely, laughter among other white males. They don’t have any discernible political agenda, and they live in Augusta.”

  “Then why are you telling us about them?” Rick asked.

  The escort smiled, something Tilly hadn’t thought he was capable of. “Because this whole situation is pretty funny, if you ask me.”

  “How so?” Tilly asked. She could already see a conspiratorial grin gliding across Rick’s face. Nothing brought black men together like shared contempt for their jobs.

  “No offense, but who the fuck cares about Stone Mountain? It’s a theme park on the outskirts of Atlanta that got one shout-out in the ‘I Had a Dream’ speech. It has the largest bas-relief in the world, but only ten people in the world even know what a damn bas-relief is. Sure, the Klan has the occasional rally there, but politically, it’s dead. People go there to picnic and walk and have fitness boot camps so they can fit into their bridesmaid dresses. Stone Mountain Park could be any park.”

  Tilly glanced at Rick. His grin had vanished entirely, replaced by the serenity of mutual recognition. I’m not the only one, Tilly knew him to be thinking. The only time she’d seen him look that at ease was when she’d mentioned that she’d once had a summer internship at a small record label in DC. He’d responded with that same look, right before badgering her for two hours, then months, about her experience. He’d had an internship at an Atlanta label, So So Def, she’d learned, along with his favorite So So Def song (“Just Kickin’ It”), his favorite music video (“Lean wit It, Rock wit It”), his favorite album cover (The Movement), and a dozen other extraneous facts. She wasn’t venturing down that road again. Bulk data—on anyone—was for the NSA. The FBI gathered evidence.

  “Thanks for the analysis, but we’re just here for perps. Who are these other three?” She glared at Rick. Don’t even fucking think about it, she signaled with that special scowl she usually reserved for street harassers and perps who refused to be arrested by a woman. He nodded.

  “These other three are a bit more unique,” the escort began, brushing aside the portraits of Jenkins and Peters. “The first thing you’ll probably notice is that they’re African American, which is unusual among cybercriminals in Georgia. I stick by my analysis, but I will admit that there are some odd behaviors among these three.”

  “First…” He picked up two portraits, waving them loosely. “We’ve been watching these two, but we’ve never actually caught them doing any illegal activity. Our monitoring campaign has been very thorough, including access to their phones, email accounts, and social media, as well as field agents occasionally tailing them, but we’ve yet to confirm their involvement in anything of concern.”

  “So why are you telling us about them?” Tilly asked.

  “Because I think they’re hiding something. Apollo Aleyani, especially. There’s no reason a seventeen-year-old in Clayton County should be using VPNs, end-to-end encrypted messaging, and IP scramblers. It raises all kinds of alarms.”

  “Sure,” Tilly said. “What else can you tell me about them?”

  “They are both affiliated with a known graffiti gang, and Theo Santos is quite fond of rap music.”

  “Criminal records?” Rick asked.

  “No.”

  “Misdemeanors? Scho
ol suspensions?” Tilly asked.

  “Nope.”

  “Bad grades?” Tilly and Rick inquired in unison.

  “Honor—”

  “—I think we’ve heard enough, next,” Rick interrupted.

  Tilly swallowed a laugh and nodded. “Well, this last one hasn’t been monitored as closely, but she’s been on our radar for about seven years,” the escort said.

  “Seven years?” Tilly scoffed. “But she’s only seventeen.”

  “When she was ten, she used a laptop to delete a federal employee’s dental plan.”

  “Are you serious?” Rick asked. Tilly could sense him winding up for a punchline.

  “Entirely. It was a mistake, we were told, but it was technically tampering with government records, so we’ve been keeping tabs on her just in case she was actually an agent provocateur. Kids are rarely what we think they are. Believe me, I manage her file. You’d be surprised at what she’s capable of.”

  “I bet she throws a mean hackathon,” Rick sneered.

  “So far, we’ve found no evidence that she hacks recreationally, but—”

  “Thank you for your time,” Tilly announced, turning toward the door. The hallway and the building at large were just as authoritarian as they had been before, but somehow, she knew her way out, easily making it back to the lobby, the escort shuffling behind her. She’d always thought the labyrinth was the Minotaur’s home, but maybe it was his prison.

  “Why don’t these NSA guys ever tell us their names,” Rick commented as they crossed the parking lot, the Command Center looming behind them.

  “The same reason strippers never give you their phone numbers.”

  Rick immediately brandished his phone. “I got fifty digits and three photo albums that will make you eat, digest, and shit those words. But I’ll play ball. Hit me.”

  “Because you’re supposed to leave your phone in the car, but you never do.”

  ° ° °

  Tilly tensed when she saw Rick swivel the audio knob to the left. He turned down his music for two reasons and two reasons only: when he had a hopeless business plan, or when he had a breakthrough. Tilly hoped, prayed, and pleaded for the latter.

  “You know,” he began, “I know this trip was unproductive, but he did mention Clayton County, and Santos was from Cobb. I’m inclined to follow up on both.”

  “You can’t be serious,” Tilly said. “That intel was garbage. Did you hear how smug he sounded? ‘It raises all kinds of alarms.’ All he had were suspicions—no evidence, no analysis, no casing. Absolutely amateur. This is why no one trusts them. They look through your windows just because you have curtains. Who knows why kids do what they do? You want me to bring the force of the state down upon two teens just because some analysts can’t tell secrecy from security? Fuck that. Rick, this is the difference between us and them. We build cases from working, not guessing. You think I’m going to put my name behind a nothing case like that? I only use this word when I’m mad, so don’t you ever bring this up again, but nigga, you’re out your goddamn mind.”

  Rick paused before speaking, a rare move. “It doesn’t matter if the intel is garbage. I’m not saying we move based on what his shit analysis can do for the case. I’m saying we move based on what that intel can do for us. This is like a free life. They gathered all these dots. We just have to connect them. If they’re wrong, so be it. But if they’re not, we save time and effort, and we get all the credit. I know you like the hunt, but why search for new prey when we already have game in our net? Think about it.”

  Tilly flicked down an AC vent and reclined her seat, gazing out onto Piedmont Avenue. The music resumed.

  “And they wonder why niggas get shot,” pondered Vince Staples.

  Inertia crept up Apollo’s body with a surprising grace. The garage door was opening at 2:12 p.m. on a weekday, and he had not just one but three members of the opposite sex seated at his dining room table. The bike in the driveway could be lied away; the girls weren’t as easily dismissed. Apollo’s eyes remained in motion, considering closets, stairs, doors, pathways. The basement and his room were obvious hideouts. But were they too obvious? Was he being watched? Was he being robbed?

  Focus. If they took the back door, they risked being seen scaling the backyard fence, which was visible from the kitchen window. If they took the front door, they might run into a parent at the mailbox. If they hid in the house, they might be trapped. Was that worse or better? Girls discovered in the basement sounded morbid; girls discovered in his bedroom sounded sordid. Would he even have a bedroom after that kitchen door opened?

  “Apollo, I thought your parents worked until six,” Sol said, breaking Apollo’s trance.

  “They do, normally,” he said, rising from the table. He wasn’t even sure if it was his mother or his father.

  “Well, today isn’t looking too normal,” Sol sneered. “I hope you don’t expect us to run out the back door like a pack of hoodrats.”

  “Hoodrats don’t move in packs,” Kai said, grabbing Zed and Sol’s arms. “The scientific name for a pack of hoodrats is a step team.”

  Unsure whether to laugh or commit ritual suicide, Apollo stayed seated. It was easier to think while sitting down.

  The kitchen door swung open as Apollo’s father entered with shopping bags.

  “Ohhh, playa playa,” his father said with a wide grin, his voice booming over the air conditioning, the closing garage door, and his own thunderous footsteps. A shoulder nudge swung the kitchen door shut, and within seconds, he had decamped to the master bedroom, not even stopping to greet their guests. His presence hung in the air, though, his cologne thick and musky, his silence filling the vacuum. Apollo felt dazed.

  Sol spoke. “Bruh, your dad is African as fuck,” she said.

  “What do you know about Africans?” asked Zed.

  “Enough to get a good tip,” Sol said with a snicker.

  The snicker snowballed into a deep, fulfilling laugh that rumbled through the room, dropping shoulders, slackening jaws, loosening backs. Apollo felt pure joy tickle its way up his stomach and into his throat, escaping into the air only to respawn in his stomach moments later. Zed pounded the table, Kai cupped her mouth, Sol rolled on the floor.

  Apollo recovered first, glancing at the clock. 2:16. Why couldn’t an entire day feel like the past four minutes?

  “So, to answer Zed’s question,” he said, “there is no way anyone will get hurt. The satellites will burn as soon as they drop out of orbit. That’s how they make satellites these days, to reduce pollution and prevent espionage. And none of these satellites serve any purpose other than surveillance. I triple-checked.”

  Sol rose from the floor. “Okay, you’ve answered all our questions about the details of the plan, but what’s the purpose? Theo wanted to shit on his old job. I get that. I want to shit on my current job. But what’s this about? What does this do for us? We’re already legends.”

  “We’re not legends,” Zed said. “No one really knows why we did what we did back in June. The hashtag was a joke, and beyond a few activists, it’s been forgotten. I followed it on social all summer. If we do this, they still won’t know why, but they’ll at least know we made our mark.”

  Apollo nodded. Zed was starting to understand the vision. He doubted she believed, though. She was so hung up on collateral damage and accidents, as if accidents were even possible with his level of organization. He’d encrypted their phones, anonymized their devices, scrambled IP logs, created scores of fake profiles for every single time he’d had to hit the forums for know-how. He had a VPN inside of his VPN, paid for with a cryptocurrency that didn’t even have a name. And they still hadn’t been caught after the tag on Stone Mountain. If that wasn’t legend status, what was?

  “You sound like Theo,” Sol said, twirling a lock in her finger. “We desecrated a Confederate monument. The Confede
rate monument. Desecration is my shit, you know this. But you have to admit that this is extra.”

  “It’s not extra, Sol,” Zed said. “It’s the real moment. We can’t go around tagging our whole lives. That’s extra.”

  A spiteful click skeeted from Sol’s teeth. “Bitch, we’re graffing, like, two weeks from now. Extra is your life.” She laughed.

  Apollo watched Zed closely. When she felt embarrassed or defeated, she produced the tiniest sigh, a whiffed huff that pressed the air like a kiss. He hadn’t heard it yet, but she looked flustered. Maybe she really did believe. Maybe he should speak.

  “Bitch, I hate you,” Zed finally snorted.

  Apollo’s face collapsed into his palm.

  Kai sighed and rose from the table. “Zed,” she said, “You still trying to play today? I finally got a new racket, and I’m not trying to hear y’all argue like we’re not already all in this shit. I’ve gone a month without group chat and dick. Real, extra, legendary, I don’t give a fuck. This is the last summer before we’re boring. The purpose is to make it count.” She turned to Sol. “Bitch, you happy now?”

  Apollo sniggered as Sol nodded begrudgingly. Kai went to retrieve her shoes from the foyer.

  “Yeah, I’m out,” Zed answered, following Kai. “You need a ride, Sol? I know you hate Kenwood, but I can drop you off first.”

  “Nah, I’m going to chill with this goober for a bit,” Sol said. “Not much going on at home right now. I cleaned it up a few weeks ago. The less time I spend there, the cleaner it stays. Plus, my bike isn’t fitting in your car.”

  “Suit yourself,” Zed said, flashing Apollo a raised eyebrow. The front door opened and closed in a blink.