Brinus was at a nightclub in the VIP room with Long Ho, management, and two level-two operatives — one who was a professional private detective; the other was also a pentester. The VIP room was smokey and had a wooden shelf of prime liquors and high-end vodkas. Mirrors adorned two walls of the room, while baroque paneling embellished the other two walls.
“I'm goin' dancing,” Brinus declared, rising from his chair.
The nightclub had pulsating techno music coming off the ground floor as he walked over to the door.
Long Ho rose from his seat and shuffled Brinus’s hair. “You do what you want. You earned it.”
Brinus smiled with pride at his recent accomplishment, which was nine years in the making.
Long Ho looked like a thirty-year-old rocker with fuzzy long hair, a black trench coat, a pair of blue jeans with a metal chain on his back pocket, and a tee shirt with a design on it. He also had a cowboy hat and was about Brinus’s height with his messy hair and the same hair color.
Brinus came up to the bar downstairs and handed the bartender four credit chips.
“I want a double whisky with no water and two rocks.”
The bartender laughed. “Do you not see the sign?”
Brinus saw a sign that said, “21 years old or older to purchase alcohol. 17 years or older to purchase nicotine products.”
Brinus showed his syndicate tattoo on his right forearm, “Is this good enough?”
The bartender poured the whisky and he sat at an empty table after scanning it. He saw a young man dancing to the music in front of the bar who looked to be Brinus’s age at 16. He looked and saw Brinus. Waving at each other, he sat down next to Brinus.
Harper was short, about one head shorter than Brinus. He had sandy brown hair, brown eyes, and creamy peach skin, a pair of skateboard shoes, khaki pants, and a plain blue tee shirt, and was physically fit — more so than Brinus.
“Hey man! It is so nice to see another kid! What’s your name?”
“Brinus Helios. What’s yours?”
“Harper Magnus.”
Brinus shook his hand. “Where are you from?”
“Saffron. I want to join the Navy when I turn 18 and get off this rock.”
Brinus smiled. “You can join at 17.”
Harper looked at Brinus with dilated pupils. He snorted, “Only if you have a skill or a trade certification. I’ve been homeless since I was 8-years-old. I got most of my education from reading books at the library. Plus I'm sixteen. ”
Brinus put his hand on Harper’s arm and Harper relaxed. “What is your favorite subject?”
“Death worlds. The idea that life can exist on planets so hostile to living creatures and evolve into space-faring societies fascinates me.” He smiled and opened up his body posture wide open.
Brinus and Harper spent an amazing night together by 4 a.m. Long Ho came downstairs to see where Brinus was as he’d been gone for almost 5 hours.
He saw him with Harper. Were they holding hands? Wait? what? They just looked at each other like they loved each other. Gross.
Long Ho came back into the VIP room. “Well, Brinus is with some guy holding hands!” 0yelled Long Ho, throwing a bottle of whisky against the mirror, cracking it, and shattering the bottle.
Management sighed and the two other operatives cussed. “Seriously?! This again!?” yelled management. The older man came up to Long Ho, jamming his finger into his chest with every word. “Everyone knows Brinus is gay! He is too valuable to the syndicate and cost too much to train! You know we have a don’t ask don’t tell policy because of him!”
“But…”
Both of the operatives laughed and snickered. Management smiled maliciously. “Why are you so obsessed with Brinus? Is it something else?”
Brinus came up from the ground floor. “Who do people gossip about?” He inquired with a smile, noticing everyone laughing, including the female servers.
Long Ho cussed and left the room.
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The next day Brinus was at his home. It was on the fifth floor of a ten-story apartment building. The apartment was a two-bedroom studio with wooden furniture and carpeted floors. There were ashtrays with 20 cigarette butts in each, everywhere. Next to Brinus’s immaculately made-up bed was a half-smoked pack of cigarettes, a lighter, and an alarm clock. The room had an herbal smell almost like cannabis but more like green tea cigarettes. The kitchen had a replicator, a spotless stove, and a meticulously clean oven with a sink and cabinets perfectly stacked. The kitchen smelled like lemons and Tarken Tea leaves. He was currently doing arm curls in his private gym which had no ashtrays and had a neutral smell. Aside from the mess of cigarettes localized to their ashtrays, the apartment oppositely complimented the grungy habit with a sterile environment.
His Triquarter rang and Brinus Answered. “Sup?”
“Your first assignment will be delivered in about ten minutes. Get your ass ready.”
“Whatever.”
Brinus hung up the phone. He put the weights back up and then put on a pair of jeans, a pair of skateboard shoes, a white tee shirt, and a black leather jacket. As he brushed his teeth, the doorbell rang. Rinsing out his mouth, he went up to the door and opened it.
It was a young man who was three years younger than Brinus holding an envelope.
“Ginger Cat?”
Brinus nodded in response to his call sign.
“Here you go.”
The kid handed Brinus his mission. He opened the envelope and inside was a picture of a building, a business card, and the name of a company. Basically, on a sheet of paper, he was told he had a week to penetrate the company headquarters.
“Also the syndicate boss told me to tell you to represent the syndicate on this job. The company is paying a premium for this. You will get paid 9000 credits plus an additional 20 percent for the job.”
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Brinus Was at the nightclub at around 10 pm. He was on his TriQuarter as he had hacked into the corporate camera network. The night shift for the security guards was under his observation. He paid attention to their security routes and had a half-drunk bottle of wheat beer and a pack of cigarettes in front of him. he switched the camera view to the front gate. One thing he’d noticed was that guards were lazy about checking IDs.
He decided to look up the employee roster to see if he could go into the mainframe. 1500 employees were listed on the roster along with all of their personal data — tax code numbers, comm frequencies, street address, images of birth certificates, and tax code cards — everything needed to steal the employees’ identity.
Harper sat in front of him with a shot of tequila in his hand.
“Hey, man! What ya doin’?”
“My job. I'm a pentester for the Orin Syndicate. I was doin' first assignment.” Brinus lifted his white tee shirt and showed his fresh burglar tattoo on his stomach. It was a man in a hoodie hunched over a laptop. “How was your day at the library? Any books you enjoyed reading?”
“I was reading a professional science journal about Death Worlds with nitrogen-based atmospheric systems with Class G Yellow Stars.”
Brinus smiled and put his TriqQarter down. “Ever thought about gettin' certified in Death Worlds?”
“I can’t afford the test. It is two thousand credits which is part of the reason I want to join the Navy because they can give me the certs for free.
If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Brinus and Harper looked at each other with dilated pupils. He knew Harper lied but he didn't care.
Brinus interjected, “I always wanted to join the navy. What do you want to do in the Navy?”
“Terraforming.”
“What if I pay for your cert?”
Harper ordered another shot of tequila. “Really?!”
“Yeah. Why not? It is refreshing to see someone my age filled with dreams.”
Harper leaned over the table and kissed Brinus. They passionately made out for a few seconds and let go.
“Sorry! I didn’t mean it! I don’t know what came over me!”
Brinus held Harper’s hand. “Do you wonna have some fun? I know a vacant house for sale across the street we can break into.”
They left the nightclub holding hands.
Several minutes later Brinus and Harper came out from the house in the front yard and then kissed again.
Harper asked Brinus. “How's your pentesting going?” He began stroking Brinus’s face as they smiled at each other.
“I think I identified an exploit.” Brinus showed him his phone. “His name’s Peter Teal from Earth. He’s the mailroom tech hired last week who doesn’t socialize. No one knows what he looks like. He missed three days fer his mother’s wedding and this week he missed five days. He lives with his father and is a video game addict. He got the job cuz of who his daddy is. He is set to be terminated today if he doesn’t get to work.”
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Brinus was on a Discord call with Peter Teal. He identified his user tag, screen name, and all of his alt accounts. The time was Four A.M. He had been gaming with Peter for over three hours to keep him from going to sleep.
"Hey bro I had a good time playing with you but I got work at seven.”
“What if I send you a beer? What’s your replicator number?”
“This will be my third beer. I will be hung over in the morning!”
“I'll send ya' somethin' special.”
“Okay, bro. Just one more round. My replicator number is 555-106-3223”
Brinus walked over to his replicator. He then replicated a beer with 22% alcohol and 250 Mg of caffeine.
He sent it over and then got an excited scream from Peter.
“Thanks, bro you’re like the best friend! I've been having issues with my father for months now. He wants me to get a job and is forcing me to work and I want to be a pro gamer.”
Brinus had to stifle a laugh. This guy he spoke to was no pro gamer and was actually worse than Brinus who only played games a couple of hours a night to relax.
“Are you laughing at me?”
Brinus realized he was laughing out loud. “No, I ain’t. Some ad played on my screen that was funny.”
There was a moment of silence and then Peter laughed. “What was the ad?”
Brinus explained the ad. By the time He finished gaming with Peter, it was six a.m. He noticed Peter lived two houses down. So Brinus walked over to his house and waited in the bushes. Peter’s father came out of the house cussing and sped off. Brinus then pressed a button on his phone which scrambled the signals for the doorbell camera.
He walked up to the door and picked the lock. It popped open. He then walked into the house, walked into Peter’s room while Peter was passed out drunk on the bed, and saw his company badge sitting on his dresser. He grabbed it and walked out.
Brinus purchased an off-the-rack suit at a department store and changed into it. He was ten minutes late reporting to the front gate. He showed the guard Peter’s badge.
The guard scanned it and Brinus parked his car in the company lot.
Brinus began taking pictures of all the cameras and doors. The passcodes were written next to the keypads on the door. A security guard stopped him as he entered the lobby.
“What are you doing?”
“Oh, I’m Al. You know Big Al? The guy from accounting?”
The guard rolled his eyes and walked away. He wasn’t paid enough to deal with this.
“Can you turn around?”
The guard turned and Brinus took a photo of the guard with his security badge and texted the C.E.O. of the company how shockley poor the security measures were.
“Who are you and what are you doing?”
“My name is Noneya and it is none’o ya business what I am doing.”
The guard rolled his eyes again and walked away.
Brinus walked up to some computer techs who were at a VP’s office.
“Mainframe trouble?”
The two techs looked at him. “What do you know?”
Brinus noticed they didn’t ask who he was, what he was doing there, or how a teenager had gained access to the building.
“Maybe I can help?”
“Sure.”
Brinus walked up to the computer and typed in one of the codes he lifted from the door panels outside. He was in. He looked at the source code of the company’s OS. “I see the problem. It is a recursive loop error in your operating system. You need to remove the data processing boolean script and replace it with a ten-point logic test ending in a math function. Here let me show you.”
Brinus spent five minutes editing the code and then hit compile. The techs were impressed. “When were you hired again? I am not familiar with your ID number. We should pay you more,” declared the VP.
“I will see you in a few hours.”
Brinus left the room and went to the bathroom. He saw four people vaping.
“Hey, what’s up?” asked one of the employees.
Brinus washed his face and hands. “Got cigarettes? I left mine at the store.”
“Sure. The vending machine is down the hall to the right. You can get lighters at the company store.”
“I assume the company store is on the ground floor?”
One of the vapers nodded.
A few minutes later, Brinus crushed his cigarette in an ashtray in the smoking area of the ground floor. He took more pictures of the cameras and noticed several blind spots notifying the C.E.O. through texts of how he was able to modify the company OS and of the blind spots in the system he noticed.
The CEO was not pleased with the change he made to the OS. However, he did notice the operating system was running a lot smoother when he came. Brinus wanted to know if he was going to end the pentest. The C.E.O. left him on read.
Brinus began walking down the hall. He had been at the company HQ for over an hour with someone else’s badge and no one asked who he was. He walked into a break room and noticed five people gathered around a card.
“Hello there! You must be a new employee! Do you wonna sign the birthday card for the CEO?”
Brinus smiled. “Why not?”
He grabbed a pen and signed his name. “Did you see the big kabochi match last night?” inquired Brinus.
“Oh, you mean between Cyrus the Virus and Tailor the Sailor? Yeah, it was epic bruh.”
“I thought it was amazing that Cyrus lasted three rounds. Tailor is fucking epic.” Said the employee holding the card.
Brinus looked at the four other employees. “I am a fan of Cyrus myself.” He stated this to be more controversial on purpose.
Suddenly Brinus received a ping on his phone from the C.E.O. He discussed the changes with the Board of Directors and said they would keep them because they cleared up a lot of issues but not to do any more IT work again. He is paid to pentest and not fix technical issues within the company.
Brinus sent a thumbs up and said he understood.
He began walking around. He noticed a meeting where all the managers from the accounting department had gathered around at a circular table. He saw donuts and coffee. Brinus was starting to get hungry and decided to push his luck.
“...so quarterly projections are on target to meet our quotas for the months and…” The VP looked at Brinus as he was pouring himself coffee. He deliberately ignored the awkward silence until she finally cleared her throat and demanded in a firm voice, “What the hell are you doing?”
“Gettin’ coffee and donuts. Why?” Brinus smiled, showing his teeth in a screw-you smile.
“Get the fuck out or I will write you up!” yelled the VP
“Let me get these delicious eclairs first.”
The VP went up to Brinus. “What is your name and badge number?”
Brinus walked out of the room before the VP could get a good look at his badge and the meeting resumed after he left. Brinus was eating his eclair and drinking his coffee on a bench outside of a VPs office.
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The hallway Brinus sat at was wide with meeting rooms all down it. The lamps were gold plated and made in the 18th century french style. The walls were glass walls with tinted and soundproof glass. The benches lining the hall were baroque style chairs plated with brass. There was a janitor mopping the marble floor.
Four cops came up to Brinus with a security guard leading the way.
“There he is. He isn’t supposed to be here,” stated the security guard.
The cops forced Brinus to his feet and put him in handcuffs. They slammed him against the wall and frisked him. They found his coin purse, two packs of cigarettes, eight lighters, and the CEO’s business card. Wait what?
The cops uncuffed him when they found his pentesting license, a police security license, and his BAR license — all of it was verified. One of the policemen asked. “Are you conducting a pentest?”
“Yes, officer I am. I’m conductin’ a pentest paid fer by Charlie Pentelli and the board of directors.” Brinus flashed his syndicate tattoo.
“Can I see what crimes you’re licensed to commit?”
Brinus showed the cop his license for the job as a second policeman scanned his syndicate tattoo. It was a real syndicate tattoo because it used the unique kind of ink that made it authentic. Brinus lifted his shirt showing his stomach and it was his burglar tattoo after presenting the cop a list of crimes he was authorized to commit. They scanned his burglar tattoo and it too was legitimate.
Brinus was escorted to the CEO’s office on the 50th floor. Brinus was then sat down in the lobby and the security guard left. Brinus pulled a cigarette but the secretary pointed at the no smoking sign above the door. Brinus smoked and lit the cigarette anyway. He took a drag and blew out. The four cops also left.
“Sir, no smoking in the CEO lobby.”
“Uh huh.” Brinus took a drag and blew out.
The Secretary curled her left lip. She got onto the phone. After a few minutes Brinus flicked the butt onto the ground and snuffed it out with his shoe.
The CEO came out and she was a tall, brown haired, blue eyed, woman in a blue suit, red high heels, and red lipstick.
“I am Charlie Pantelli. You can call me Mrs. Pantelli. I will be taking the money it costs to get the smell out of my lobby out of your pay.” Brinus noticed she had a wedding ring on her finger.
Brinus smiled showing his teeth in his screw-you smile.
Charlie growled and then motioned for him to follow her. He came up and walked into her office.
The CEO sat at her executive chair and motioned for him to sit. He sat down and crossed his legs.
“I see you do business in the Federation.”
The CEO rolled her eyes and slammed her hand on the desk. “Don’t get me started. I shut down the last factory this week. I tell you what, with the way things are going over there will be a war in three to five years.”
“What’s your opinion on their social justice movement?”
“I don’t discuss politics with business associates. I want you to give me your verbal assessment of our security.”
Brinus cleared his throat and stated, “Yes ma’am. So, I noticed every camera had blind spots, your doors had passcodes next to the keypads, your security staff were so apathetic they didn’t even care I was taking photos of doors and cameras. I also noticed not one person asked why a 16-year-old with someone else’s badge had gained access to the campus. I even used a random passcode I got off of the door outside to make modifications to your company Operating System. Overall your security grade is an F-minus. It took disrupting a meeting and getting snacks to get caught.”
“I expect your written report in four days. Here is the check for the pentest. Have a nice day.”
Brinus nodded. He looked at his check and it was 90,000 credits. He asked. "This is supposed to be 100,000 credits."
Charli sighed, "I knocked off 10,000 credits for smoking in my office. Don't smoke again."
Brinus snorted and lefted.