Vanishing Point

by J G Alva

  Three saw his chance, and swung once more at Sutton. He was able to twist away to avoid getting hit in the head, but it went in behind his left shoulder. A hard hit. Pain shot up Sutton’s back. It made him angrier. He ran at the third man, hollering, a war cry – or something like it – barrelling him into the wall. Trapping his assailant’s head and his right arm – the arm with the bat – against the wall with his own bat, Sutton was able to deliver three solid blows to his stomach before Three grabbed his arm to prevent him from delivering any more blows. He was strong, in pain but powered by desperation. Sutton shook the hand off, feinted, and as the guy tried once more to protect his stomach, Sutton instead went for the low blow, pounding him in the groin.

  The man screamed.

  Sutton released him, and he fell to the floor, protectively cupping his crotch.

  Then he felt metal against the back of his head.

  And he heard the click.

  The hammer being drawn back.

  Unmistakable.

  A gun.

  Sutton froze.

  “Drop the fucking bat.”

  He didn’t recognise the voice.

  Sutton did as he was told.

  Still keeping the gun on Sutton, First Man edged past him. He was holding his side with his free hand and breathing in short, sharp gasps. Definitely a broken rib or two.

  “Get up,” First Man told his friend.

  The second guy was on his feet, but the third man was still writhing in agony.

  “Help him,” First Man ordered.

  The second man reached down and helped the third man up.

  “Who are you?” Sutton asked. “What do you want?”

  “Don’t move,” First Man told him, keeping the gun pointed at his face.

  Together, the three mysterious assailants backed along the passage, until they were just spectral figures, smudges of colour in the mist…

  And then they were gone.

  ◆◆◆

  “What happened to eye?” Lucia asked, distraught.

  “Meteor,” Sutton said.

  “What?”

  “I was attacked. Give me that towel.”

  Lucia passed the towel to him, and he used it to wipe the blood from his eye.

  It hurt…but it wasn’t so much the wound as the damage beneath it that was bothering him. He had a splitting headache, like a hundred knitting needles stabbing his brain.

  Lucia looked anxious. She was wearing lacy knickers and nothing else. She was a wonderful sight; a perfect antidote to a beating.

  “Should I call police?” She asked.

  “No. It’s fine. See that top drawer?”

  He pointed to the drawer underneath the kitchen sink. She followed his finger and nodded.

  “There’s some painkillers in there. Purple box. Co-codamol. Get them for me.”

  She scurried to retrieve them while he negotiated the furniture, gratefully sinking on to the sofa with a sigh. They had really done a number on his back. He could barely move.

  “Here,” she said, handing him the drugs.

  “Water?”

  “Oh yes.”

  She got a glass of water for him.

  “Thank you,” he said, and then swallowed two of the pills. He washed them down with the water. “Do you know where my phone is?”

  “I go look,” she said fretfully, and disappeared into the bedroom.

  Sutton closed his eyes. He pressed the towel against the wound above his eye. His whole eye would probably swell up. Wonderful.

  “Here,” Lucia said, handing him the phone.

  “Thank you. You’re a good girl.”

  She wrung her hands.

  “What happened, Sutton? I thought you just running.”

  He struggled to see the numbers on the phone, but was finally able to dial. He held the phone to his ear while it rang.

  “I was,” he told her. “Someone attacked me.”

  “Should we go hospital?”

  “No. I’ll be fine.”

  The phone was finally answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Fin?”

  “Sutton. Oh man, you’re not going to believe what I found –“

  “Get over here. Now. Someone just attacked me.”

  “What? Who?”

  “I don’t know. But we obviously shook someone up. That’s why I want you to get over here. Safety in numbers. Whatever you’ve found, bring it with you. We’ll go through it here.”

  “Okay. But the bus is going to take an hour –“

  “No. Get a taxi.”

  “Can’t you pick me up?”

  “Uh…I can’t drive right now.”

  “Why?”

  “Fin, just…take a taxi.”

  “But that’ll cost a fortune –“

  “Fin, for fuck’s sake…My treat. Alright? Just get over here.”

  A brief pause.

  “Alright. I’m on my way.”

  He hung up.

  Sutton threw the phone on to the low coffee table. He felt exhausted. He dropped his head back on the sofa. He closed his eyes.

  When he opened them again, Lucia was still standing over him, anxious and distressed.

  “Lucia?”

  “Yes?”

  “Go put some clothes on. We have a guest coming.”

  She seemed happy to have something to do.

  ◆◆◆

  “Your eye looks like shit.”

  Fin emptied the contents of his satchel on to the coffee table: laptop, printouts, notepads, and photographs.

  Sutton hadn’t really moved from his place on the sofa…except to retrieve Fin from the estate entrance of course. It had been a humbling task, even with the painkillers numbing everything; he had seen himself reduced to the physical prowess – or lack thereof – of an eighty year old man. If his attackers had been waiting for him, then there would have been very little that he could have done to prevent another assault…Luckily, his brief excursion had incurred no further reprisals, and both he and Fin had made it back to the flat unmolested.

  “Thanks,” Sutton said sardonically.

  “Do you want hot drink, Fin?” Lucia asked, calling out from the kitchen.

  Fin turned.

  “Coffee please, Lucia. Thank you.”

  “Good. Sutton, I must go soon. I have class.”

  Sutton shook his head.

  “You can’t. It’s too dangerous. You’ll have to stay here.”

  “I don’t know anything –“

  “It doesn’t matter. You’re not leaving.”

  Lucia stamped one foot on the floor in frustration, and then muttered a lot under her breath, possibly in Italian. Possibly it was cussing. Then there was a lot of unnecessary banging of pots and utensils.

  “I think she’s upset,” Fin whispered.

  “Really? I hadn’t noticed. Just tell me what you found.”

  “First you’ve got to tell me who attacked you. Did you recognise them?”

  Sutton shook his head.

  “No. They wore balaclavas. We’ll come back to that. I need to think about it. Just tell me what you’ve found out.”

  Fin stared at him, suspicious maybe, then relented.

  “Okay. Just get ready to have your socks blown off.”

  “Let’s hear it.”

  “Right.” Fin held up Masters’ pen that had turned out to be a flash drive. “The memory stick. Nothing on it, right? Or so we thought. But after you left, I started to wonder. The memory stick itself was hidden in the pen, and that seemed pretty clandestine…so what if whatever was on it had been similarly disguised, in an equally advanced and clandestine way?”

  “You found something.”

  “I’m getting to it,” Fin said, vaguely irate. He didn’t want Sutton to spoil his presentation. “So I contacted this guy I know. I’m good with computers and databases and stuff, but this guy is the mutt’s nuts. He writes software for a company that designs video editing programmes…Anyway. He knows his s
tuff, is what I’m getting at. So I called him and asked him what could he do. He said to bring the offending item over – he only lives about half a mile from me – and he would take a look. So I did, and he did. And this is what he found.”

  Fin quickly ran through the printouts before finding the one he was after. He passed it to Sutton.

  Sutton looked at it. There were groups of numbers, in blocks, but they weren’t exactly random…

  “Bank accounts?” Sutton guessed.

  Fin nodded.

  “No names. But current statements, transaction history, and all the security information you’d need to access them. Maybe twenty of them in all.”

  “Why would Chris Masters have this? How does he have this?”

  Fin held up a finger.

  “I’m coming to that.” He rifled around for another printout, found it, offered it to Sutton. “Here.”

  Sutton took it. Every time he leaned forward, it felt like the top of his spine might pop out of his back. It was bruised and tender.

  This sheet was a jumbled mass of characters. It might have been computer code.

  “What am I looking at, Fin?” This wasn’t helping his headache much.

  “A Trojan Horse. A very sophisticated one.” Fin frowned. “You know what a Trojan Horse is, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Sorry. You’re a bit older, I just thought –“

  “This was on the memory stick as well?”

  Fin nodded.

  “My computer buddy freaked out when he saw it. Because he recognised the code.”

  “Recognised the code?”

  Fin said, “certain programmers have a style. Like…like painters, I suppose. You could look at a Van Gogh and know it was one of his paintings, just at a glance. Right? Well, it’s the same for programmers.”

  Sutton was confused.

  “So this code is from a famous programmer or…?”

  Fin smiled a strange smile and said, “this code belongs to The Rumbler.”

  ◆◆◆

  CHAPTER 11

  Saturday, 4th June

  “The Rumbler?” Sutton asked. “Is that name meant to mean something to me?”

  Lucia came out of the kitchen with a mug of coffee; she passed it to Fin, and then disappeared down the back hallway. She reappeared, carrying her purse, and then he heard the bathroom door slam shut. She was a wonderful girl, he thought, but she was no good in a crisis.

  Fin made a see-sawing motion in the air with his hand. He sipped the coffee.

  “He’s sort of like an urban legend. No one knows if he really exists. Well. They know he exists, but no one knows who he is. If he’s one man even…or if he’s a team of guys.”

  “And what does this Rumbler do?”

  Fin said solemnly, “very bad things.”

  “Like?”

  “Blackmail people.” Fin indicated the list of bank accounts. “With stuff from your computer. From any computer. From any technical device. He’s a hacker, that’s what he does…but the way he does it, that’s the really disturbing part. He researches you. He’s not a smash-and-grab kind of guy. He finds your weak spots…then exploits them.”

  “How does that work?” Sutton asked, intrigued…but also a little sceptical.

  “It depends,” Fin said. His voice was coloured with a shade of awe; The Rumbler was a celebrity, of sorts, at least to him. “If he can hack into your computer, well…he can do anything. Okay. Here’s an example. So say that you’re married. Say that you like to look at a little porn. Say that your tastes are…a little unusual. Then The Rumbler sends you a message: pay up, or I send this information to your wife’s e-mail.” Fin spread his hands. “The guy is always going to pay up.”

  “Seems like a lot of work for very little gain,” Sutton remarked, not convinced.

  “But this is the thing,” Fin said. “The Rumbler is ruthless. He can tear your life apart, if he wants…and he has done. He’s got that power…and you’ll never get to meet him. Apparently, one story goes that The Rumbler caught a very important figure, an owner of a large conglomerate, on a porn site one day and he was, you know…”

  Fin made a masturbating gesture.

  Sutton nodded.

  “Right.”

  “So what The Rumbler does is to turn the man’s own webcam on, record him doing his thing, and then threaten to e-mail it to everyone in the company he owns. And his competitors.”

  “Of course the man would pay.”

  “No,” Fin said, shaking his head. “You don’t understand. He didn’t want money from this guy. He needed him to break into a house for him. To collect something.”

  “What did he want to collect?”

  Fin shrugged.

  “I have no idea.”

  “That’s a rubbish story,” Sutton said dismissively.

  “It’s the truth,” Fin protested. He sipped more of the coffee. “He did it too. The guy who owned the company.”

  “I don’t believe it. How come this story got out? Who would this guy tell?”

  “He actually got caught breaking into this house. That’s how the story got out.”

  “Whose home was it then? And what was The Rumbler after? I understand why it made sense to get someone else to do the breaking and entering – to reduce the risk – but why this guy? If he was so inept? I don’t believe it.”

  Fin waved that away.

  “I don’t know the details. Anyway. It doesn’t matter. I heard he’s rung people up and pretended to be from their bank; pretended to be their solicitors; pretended to be their own relatives. I heard he’s even visited houses and – using the information he hacked from their computers – has walked around people’s homes pretending to be whoever he needs to be to put in his cameras or his microphones: a guy from BT, an electrician, a surveyor. What I’m trying to say is, he’s got balls. And he’s not afraid to use them. If you’ve got a secret, then beware, because he’ll find it, whatever it is. That’s what he does. He uses people’s secrets against them. To get what he wants. If you got a secret…then you’re rumbled.” Fin spread his hands. “Hence the name.” He rifled through some paperwork. “Here,” he said, selecting a newspaper article he had printed out. “There’s no official confirmation, but this is about a victim of an online blackmailer. Read it. It could be The Rumbler.”

  BUSINESSMAN BLACKMAILED BY HACKER OVER YEAR-LONG SURVEILLANCE…AND HACKER STILL RELEASED FOOTAGE.

  Police say businessman “Matt” was the victim of a year-long campaign against him by experienced hackers, and that the Cyber Crime Division are closing in on the people responsible.

  “Matt” was contacted in September of this year by e-mail. Immediately, there was a request for money, or the information collected over the “protracted period” would be released not just to relatives, but also to business colleagues. Matt was initially sceptical.

  “I didn’t believe it,” Matt told this reporter, in the pleasant kitchen of his home. The stress of such an event, sometime in the past, can still be seen in his eyes however. “So I refused to pay. After which, I immediately received a small audio file. I clicked on it to see what it was. I couldn’t believe it. It turned out to be a conversation I had had in my living room. A very private conversation, with someone close to me.”

  Matt checked the house for listening devices, but could not find any. There was no way this hacker could have recorded this conversation…and yet that was exactly what he had done.

  “Do we know who ‘Matt’ is?”

  Fin smiled.

  “We sure do. It took me a while, but I eventually found out that the man’s name is David Altman. And he lives here in Bristol. He might be worth talking to.”

  “Good. So are we saying that Chris Masters is The Rumbler? Do we believe that?”

  Fin shrugged.

  “Maybe.”

  “But he doesn’t own a computer. Remember? There wasn’t one in his flat.”

  “That we could find.”

 
“You think he has a work space? Like an office?”

  Fin nodded.

  “It would make sense. Remember what his sister said? That he didn’t trust technology? Well, if he was The Rumbler, you can understand why. After all the things he’s done. I think the most advanced gadget we saw in his flat was a VCR. There’s no way anyone’s hacking him.” Fin turned to his laptop, and began typing. “There’s something else as well. That we found on the memory stick.”

  “Something else? What?”

  Fin nodded.

  “Audio files. Lots of them. But no names, no dates. Absolutely nothing whatsoever to tie them to the people involved. They’re saved under a number. So there’s an index somewhere, but not on this memory stick. Same for the bank information.”

  “What are the audio files of?”

  “Listen.”

  Fin pressed a button on the laptop.

  Hissing.

  Muffled footsteps.

  A shout.

  Everything sounded distorted, as if the microphone had been wrapped in a blanket.

  Then two people started talking.

  One old and one young, Sutton guessed.

  Young: “I’ve done more than you ever could. Because I had the nerve to do it.”

  Old: “you’re sick. And no amount of therapy is going to cure you. What am I meant to do with you?”

  Crackling.

  Then…

  Young: “…problems are over.”

  Old: “is this your way of trying to prove yourself?”

  Young: “I have proven myself.”

  A weird scuffling sound.

  Then, the old man’s voice, distraught, crying out: “my God, what are you? Get out, get out, get OUT.”

  Fin pressed a button on the laptop, and the sound stopped.

  He looked at Sutton with his eyebrows raised.

  “Shit,” Sutton said. “And there’s more?”

  “About two hundred in all,” Fin said. “Two hundred recordings of people’s dirty little secrets. Here. Listen to this one.”

  Fin selected a file on the screen and began playing it.

  The quality of this was much better, but still distorted.

  Sutton soon realised it was a phone conversation, with one person outside, on the move. Maybe in a car.