by A. Bernette
“And, it’s a lot of talking. Stephen, you are putting me to sleep. Get to the good part,” Stella said over his shoulder.
Stephen ignored Stella. “Over the past six months or so they’ve been looking at data from over the past couple years much closer. It was tremors and earthquakes, especially around the pump holes; you know where they dump the emissions and gases.”
“The fault lines closest to the holes are more active than the ones far away. There’s a trend and Stephen and my mom’s team have finally started making sense of it over the past few months,” Stella said smiling smugly at Stephen.
“Wait, why were they even tracking the earthquakes? Isn’t that what the Science Institute is for?” Alexis quickly jumped in.
“They didn’t use to track the tremors and earthquakes that closely. It was only when it directly impacted our main work we had to look at it too. There were too many changes in ocean life to not look into it more. It’s getting worse,” Stephen said before Stella could try to explain.
“I’m not the expert but from what I’ve seen, it’s to the point that something big could happen, like a serious earthquake or even a volcano sometime soon. When it happens, because, yes, it probably will, it could kill a lot of people,” Stella chided.
“And there is more than one place at risk so we are talking a lot of people,” Stephen jumped in again.
“Serious as in worse than what happened here?” asked Marco who was now looking at his screen as the files were populating. Stephen managed to peak his interest, but he and Alexis were in the middle of something else – their little fun game with potentially serious consequences.
“In reality that wasn’t a major event Marco. It was bad enough, with the structural damage, but very few lives were lost. To answer your question - yes, possibly,” Stephen said bluntly.
“So what’s it all mean?” Alexis asked.
Stephen scratched his head. “It means the need for mass relocation of billions of people in a short period of time.” Marco and Alexis looked at Stephen, waiting for more.
“And that is hard to do. It costs a lot of money and there is no place for them to live.” Stella stepped in realizing her brother wasn’t picking up on the cues.
“Oh. That’s rough,” Marco said rubbing his chin distractedly.
All of the data they were after was in and it was time to finish up and get out. “Hold on,” Marco added.
He stopped the video feed and sound. Alexis and Marco had to quickly make sure they had everything saved. The files being synced must have been over one hundred and they were forced to jump through the interspace of the subsystem in order to protect the two hackers.
Marco looked at the remaining time left to completion. He could tell someone was trying to track them right now and they risked their location being compromised the longer they remained tied in.
He smiled to himself as he thought of the person on the other end who was probably swearing right now as the files floated across space and time. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Complete. He immediately disconnected everything from the Region’s system. They were done.
Alexis turned to give him a high five. “We did it. We actually did it. Crap! I can’t believe we did it. What if they are still trying to track us? What if we get caught? I could lose my funding for school, or even get kicked out, or worse. Marco. What if we made a big mistake?” Alexis continued, feeling both exhilarated and scared at the same time.
“Al, calm down. This isn’t even like you. We did everything right. Just like we planned for months. If what Stephen is saying is true, this could be even more valuable. Don’t worry, we aren’t going to get caught and you are going to be fine. Besides, I,” Marco stopped talking as his phone beeped.
“I forgot I put Stephen on hold,” he accepted the call again.
“Hey. Sorry about that. We had to finish something up over here. Now what was this again about relocating people and time and money?”
Stephen was irritated, noticeably and Marco wasn’t helping. “Look Marco, we have a situation where it is very likely that the earth is going to crack and swallow up millions or billions of people or it’s going to explode and make lava structures out of millions or billions of people. It’s not likely anyone can get that many people relocated before our projections show the first series of serious earthquakes. You know earthquakes are triggers for volcanoes.” Stephen was almost breathless having said all of that without a single inhale.
Stella stood in the background waiting with Stephen for Marco’s response. Of course, he could have said anything and it wouldn’t have mattered. She just liked looking at him.
He had these soul stirring brown eyes and thick wavy hair that dusted his forehead. His skin looked like he’d lived near the equator his whole life and she could imagine he had his pick of girls. After all, he was there with Alexis. Perky, persistent, pretty, persuasive Alexis. Whatever they had going on, Stella reasoned she didn’t stand a chance but it didn’t hurt to appreciate the view.
“And you are telling all this to me because?” Marco didn’t get what he had to do with any of what Stephen was saying. Stephen was unsure of exactly how to put the next part and afraid of saying anything else over his regular communication.
“Can you log into our science class chat site. It uses a secure system? I think it’s better if we talk there.”
Marco got on Alexis’s system and pulled up the portal to the chatroom for the classroom. At the same time, Stephen was connecting in through his system. He had state of the art equipment like everyone on the ARC.
Stella didn’t even try to hide her boredom as she sat behind Stephen. “So, Alexis, how do you think you did on your final project? I passed mine, which was enough.”
“I got a really high mark. While you went down and played on that piano I was studying. So yeah, I did well,” Alexis teased her. “Are you still going back to civilization with all this new stuff happening?”
Stella looked at Stephen. That question wasn’t even something she’d considered yet. “I don’t see why not. They can take all this info home with us, right Stephen?”
Stephen looked over at Stella. He hadn’t been listening. “What?”
“We can take all this home and you guys can keep working on it from there, right?” Stella asked again.
“Yes. It will go home with us,” Stephen answered quickly.
Stella suddenly felt like there was something else going on or someone watching but didn’t see anything on Stephen’s screen to show someone else besides the two of them. It was like a ghost in the system. She could feel the energy but didn’t know where it was coming from.
Stella spoke into the class chat portal where she could see Marco and Alexis. “Guys, could someone else be watching what you write here but not show up in the chat? You know, hide themselves?”
“There’s not a setting like that I’ve ever seen. Then again, I don’t usually go in here for fun, you know?” Marco replied sarcastically. “If someone wanted to, there’s always an invisible in. You just have to know the vulnerabilities, the weak points, and then you start there. Why?”
“I feel like someone may be lurking in there. Watching. I know it’s silly - strange and I can’t really explain it, but when I get this kind of feeling, my hands tingle and get warm. Is there any way you can check?” she wondered.
“If you think something’s there Stella, we should probably pay attention to it,” Alexis said turning to Marco.
“It would be hard to do unless you have the teacher code and I’ve never had a reason to get those because it’s just never been that important to me,” replied Marco.
He knew there was a way to do it, but didn’t see why anyone would be in there this time on a Saturday night, for no reason, in an invisible state. Like him, most people had better things to do with their time.
“I doubt we have anything to worry about Stella,” Stephen said hurriedly, wanting to get going. “Look, we are both in and I s
ee you. Make sure you put voice on. Turn the video off, just to be safe and I’m going to disconnect this other video.”
Stephen abruptly shut off the video that Stella and Alexis had just used to talk and turned his attention back to the chat room he and Marco were logged into.
“Seriously, Stephen? We are in a class chat with our classroom IDs used to log in and with our voices on here and you don’t think they can figure out who we are because we don’t have the video on?” Marco asked and Alexis laughed in the background.
“Fine, you put your video on if you want. Mine is staying off,” Stephen huffed.
“I think you are forgetting that you need to show him some things on this side and you will actually need the video,” Stella reminded him.
She was getting a little tired and annoyed. It was already late and with all that was happening, nobody was going to be sleeping in tomorrow, even after the party. It was going to be all work, even if she didn’t do anything there’d be too much going on for her to sleep.
Seeing Marco and Alexis’s faces reappear brought a smile back to Stella’s face. They could see her and Stephen too. “You ready over there?” Stephen asked before going on this time.
“Ready. Now what is the big deal?” Marco asked.
“Ok. We have to report all of this to the funders at the science divisions of UniCorps and the World Consensus. My mom is sending the report tomorrow morning. I’m afraid they won’t do anything about it. They’ll try to deny it, say the science isn’t right, or just bury it.”
“Why do you think our government would do that?” Alexis asked sarcastically. “They have a policy of honesty and service. It’s in the creed.” They all laughed.
The creed had been established when the World Consensus had been created nearly eighty years before. Before the World Consensus, the government had become so corrupt and dishonest that no one outside of the government knew what was going on.
When the World Consensus was formed it was with the promise to be different. The founding leaders promised transparency so people knew what was happening and trust could be rebuilt. Shortly after the new government came to order, there was a great amount of money and investment put into science, research, education, social programs, health issues, and the environment.
They began investing in schools for everyone. Their grandparents retold stories from their parents who’d lived through the earlier years of the World Consensus. They’d lived through the transition from individual nations to one world but Marco, Alexis, Stephen, and Stella had only read about it in reports of history.
“I need to make sure we don’t lose this fight. We have to make sure they don’t bury it. We have to make sure people know the truth if they do try to bury it. They have a right to know,” Stephen pleaded.
There was silence for a moment and then a sound that almost seemed like static. It was a faint electrical pulsing and then it was gone.
Stella turned to look at Stephen. “What was that? Did you all hear that?”
“I heard it too,” Alexis added. It was like something else was happening in the background.
“Hold on. Let me try something. I’m gonna disconnect and reconnect. Maybe what we were working on earlier is causing some kind of interference. Be back in just a minute,” Marco said.
Marco disconnected from the class platform and rebooted his entire system.
“Alexis, make a copy of what we got from Southern Allegiance on a microdot. I have a feeling it may be important down the road,” he said, turning to Alexis and continuing to disconnect out of the school’s entire system.
“I think it just might too. I’ll keep one and give you one.”
Alexis started putting the data on two separate microchips. Marco finished the disconnection only to start reconnecting again so they could get back on with Stephen and Stella. She does have big pretty hair just like Alexis said, Marco thought.
Stephen disconnected and reconnected too, just in case the issue was on his end. He paced back and forth in front of the display and Stella lay on the bed. She was tired after her early morning and the end of camp party they’d had the night before. She needed to rest but from what she could tell, that wasn’t going to happen. Her mind had too many thoughts running around and she was picking up on some strange things.
“Stephen, I don’t think that was Marco causing the interference. Someone was there. Like a ghost in the machine. Someone or something was there with you and Marco in that chat room. If we hear it again, we should just ask who it is,” she muttered in a voice that sounded tired.
The screen came back up and then it showed one other user in the room. Marco’s face popped back up and then immediately began to break up into pixels.
“Marco you are coming through broken up. What do you think’s going on?” Stella asked.
“Not sure. You’re doing the same thing. There is definitely interference. Let’s hurry up. Can you somehow get the data to me, Stephen, in a safe way?” Marco asked quickly.
“Do you have a system with a secure virtual pass connection that goes through the interspace?” Stephen asked.
“Of course I do. Do you?” Marco asked back sounding insulted by Stephen’s question.
“Yes. I am going to copy it into a virtual pass through file. It takes a while, but once it reconnects on your end, you’ll have to use a password to pull all the files back together. I’ll start the copying and I’ll send you the password encrypted. We can’t use this room but,” Stephen was cut off by a sharp static sound and his image once again was broken up.
“I’ll be back in touch in five, the other way. Get outta this room.” Stephen shut off the connection abruptly.
“Let’s go say good night to mom and dad now, so they don’t try to say good night later, Stephen. Come on. Maybe it’ll give your system time to work any bugs out.” Stella grabbed Stephen’s arm and drug him out of the room. Their parents would be coming for them soon and she didn’t want to be surprised.
***
More than four thousand miles away in Australia, Canson Pritchard had lost the connection, again. He hadn’t been able to get in without interrupting the class chat session. He was certain Marco had done something to the chat room that blocked other users from coming in.
Marco was too good and now Canson had missed his chance, a unique chance that could have helped the mission leap forward. He wasn’t sure he’d end up with a chance like that again. He took comfort in knowing the groundwork was being laid and the pieces were falling into place just like the Earth Council had planned. He knew another way would open up.
Chapter Nineteen
Static
Antarctic Research Center
Stella sat in anticipation on the bed behind Stephen as he sent a message to Marco that he was ready to talk again. They didn’t have any other way to talk besides the classroom chat site and he hoped what they’d done would make it secure this time.
The four had all agreed that the second they heard or felt anything strange, they’d disconnect. Stephen was already nervous, checking and double-checking the connection, the site, and what he was hearing in the background.
He didn’t want to break the law by sharing this information or have his parents get in trouble, but he had to know what was going on and what the secure files in the Noah folder were. The only person he knew who could do it was Marco.
Marco sat down in front of his system and camera. He could see Stephen in front and Stella behind him.
“Hey Stephen, Stella. So I got the file and the encrypted one. I take it you want me to try and open them?” Marco asked as he made copies of both on his side.
Stephen looked around as if someone might be there unexpectedly. “Yes. I can’t get into them. I thought maybe you could. I need to get access to everything on there. I am pretty sure something is being hidden from us that is important,” Stephen answered in a loud whisper.
“I can try,” Marco said looking at the small microdot in his hand.
“I think if we can find out what’s on there, we can figure out how everything connects and why these people are acting like they are,” Stephen said before stopping at the first sound that hinted there might be interference.
“Talk later,” he said abruptly and disconnected. “Who do you think it is?” Stephen asked Stella.
“Or it could be a what,” Stella suggested. She thought it was strange that the interference happened again.
“Turn off your camera completely and disconnect from everything. I don’t want someone tracking or hacking us,” she added.
“Good idea. I still need to understand who it is. Can you send Marco a message for me from your system?” Stephen asked Stella optimistically.
“Yeah, but someone may be tracking that too,” Stella answered.
“I’ll set it up for you so that it’s a one sided message with a mid-way source scrambler. Nothing can come in that way, the source will be hidden, and only you can send out. Once the message is out, I’ll switch it back,” Stephen assured her.
Stephen and Stella scooted out his door, checking the hallway for their parents and anyone else before scurrying into Stella’s room, closing the door and locking it immediately behind them. Stella resumed her position, on the bed, while Stephen took the chair and got back to work.
“You can just send the message yourself. You know what you need to say, I don’t,” Stella said while looking at the back of Stephen’s head.
“No. I’ll tell you what we need to say to him. I need you to write it out in your words. You’ll say it different than I would,” Stephen said.
