Chapter 40: Break and Enter

The second class DI drew a C-shaped network made of nodes on the chalkboard. He didn’t bother to let them know their type except for the green circle—the entry node—at the bottom. From the middle of the network, he branched off another line with two more nodes and capped it off with a red diamond in the center.

“Our security node is here.” The DI tapped the red diamond with the end of his chalk. “It will start a search for you in the event you fail your security check.”

Model, in the desk beside Dozer, scrunched up his face.

“What?” Dozer mouthed the word.

“This isn’t hacking.” Model whispered over the aisle. “There’s no social engineering here.” He tapped the screen. “Script kitten bullshit.”

The DI spoke over the recruit’s heads. “If the search reaches your icon, the system will lockout for a predetermined time. So let’s bring all these elements together.” He meshed the fingers of both hands together. “Open Lesson One.”

Dozer tapped the screen of his tablet. It woke and displayed a list of lessons numbered from one to ten, written in white text. Each one had a shaded red X beside them. He had used high-resolution color tablets before on Hadfield but only for specialized needs. The game had its occasional perks.

He pressed Lesson One. The C-shaped network appeared, albeit with a couple of short lines that branched off from each corner of the ‘C’. A pulsing point of light—Dozer’s icon—illuminated the entry node. It revealed the next node, a simple connector, a +1% within its boundaries. A box at the lower left-hand corner said Security Check, with 0% underneath.

I bet the control node is at the top end of the ‘C’.

“Your goal is to find and turn on the power to your level.” The DI wandered to the other end of the chalkboard. “Don’t rush. Familiarize yourself with the network before you make any attempts. You won’t take any fire in the classroom here.”

Model rolled his eyes. It seemed he felt above this approximation of hacking. Buttstroke, in the desk in front, sat back in his chair, draped one arm over the back of his chair, and put the terminal in his lap. Beside Dozer, Errorist tapped a finger against the surface of his desk. Everyone got trained to hack, but the corpsmen could do it through their drones. It looked like Errorist wanted to dive in. Acid let out a sigh from behind Dozer.

“Everyone get hacking!” The DI sent out his voice loud and clear. He let the recruits off their leashes.

Dozer clicked the connector node, and his light icon left the entry node. When it arrived at the connector, a thin red progress bar appeared beside Dozer’s icon, sped upward, and turned to green in completion. The Security Check box expanded like a soap bubble, turned red, and faded. The new 1% flashed green. Any new access, even the lowly connector node, risked triggering a security search.

The next node shed its unknown icon, a simple box, and replaced it with the map one with a +5% inside. Dozer pressed it and closed one eye to check the WarFace. Just like the DI had said, a notification that he had gotten a bit of experience, 0.5 XP in this case, waited for him. It would make sense the corpsmen would need the bonuses since they would have less opportunity to shoot at the bots.

The Security Check flashed 6%. A pulse from the map icon traveled along the network and took a right turn along the branch where the red diamond security node lay. It traveled through the first unknown icon and ended at the unknown behind to reveal both as connectors. Once the map fulfilled its function, the next node flipped to reveal a control icon called VENTS with +10%.

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“Fucking shit,” said Acid, under his breath, more to himself than anyone else.

Acid must have tripped the security search already. Dozer dragged his attention back to the screen. He tapped the control node in the corner. With it captured, the next two icons, one on the main line and the other on the secondary line, revealed themselves. The short branch ended in a recycle bin icon with +15% on it. When a search encountered a captured recycle bin, the search would come to a standstill, even on other branches, until it recaptured the node.

Dozer ignored the recycle bin and clicked on the next icon on the main branch, a connector. A firewall node with +25% appeared where the security line met the main one. The Security Check box showed 17%. Capturing the firewall would up his Check and turn any further nodes into a real gamble, but he had no other choice. He clicked it.

“Shit cunt mother fucker!” Acid slammed his fist onto his desk. No doubt the security search caught up with him and booted him out of the network. He put on a smiley face when he thought people could see, but the guy had that sword of Damocles over his head. The stress of looming death must have got to him.

“Aren’t you corpsmen supposed to be wiz kids?” Though Dozer spoke to Acid, he kept his eyes on his screen and clicked the firewall.

“I’m a turn-based strategy guy.” Acid’s regular voice returned. “Not this real-time shit.”

Buttstroke spoke over his shoulder to Acid. “Why don’t you shut the fuck up and let my fireteam hack?”

The DI watched the exchange out of the corner of his eye. “I set the lockout time to zero, so you can jump back in,” he said to the class.

Errorist shot up. His eyes bulged. “I got it!” He pointed a finger gun at the terminal, make a gunshot noise, raised the ‘barrel’ to his lips, and blew away the imaginary smoke.

He had finished before anyone else in a Charlie. If anybody deserved to act like a goofball, that goofball did.

How the hell did he get it so fast?

“Good on ya,” the DI gave Errorist a half salute, “but don't be giving out the solution, ya hear?”

Coldcase observed Errorist from across the room. His eyes went wide. Something must have clicked in his head. He focused back on the screen.

Dozer didn’t compete with the security search, but he had wasted precious seconds. More like he worked against the other recruits. He didn’t notice he had captured the firewall, so he checked the security node. It hadn’t changed. If it had, the security check could have ravaged the network, and Dozer wouldn’t have even realized.

He clicked on the next icon, a data node with +15% with a short secondary line behind it. The data didn’t do much besides give him XP and bump up his security check to 57%. From here on in, Dozer would more likely set off the search than not.

“Yes!” Coldcase did a little jump in his seat. His teammates muttered congratulations.

The DI marched over toward Coldcase’s side of the classroom. “Make sure you finish your own exercise before you tongue each other’s assholes.”

The capture revealed the next node, the second to last in the main line—a map node—and the other one on the secondary line—a recycle bin. Dozer clicked on the map.

Halfway through the progress, the security node with the rest of the network flashed red. A red bar, the dreaded security search, left the security node and made quick work of the first connector.

The capture progress bar flashed green. The map pulse zipped backward along the main line to the end of the secondary branch behind the recycle bin and revealed a control node. Another control node appeared at the end of the main line, Dozer’s precious goal.

The check hit the firewall, and its progress stalled. Dozer wasted no time and clicked the control node behind the map. A progress bar appeared beside it.

Something’s wrong.

The control node he clicked on said DOORS. Dozer traced back to where the map pulse stopped. That node said POWER. He ground his teeth. A muscle in his neck twinged and cramped.

Dozer tapped the DOORS control to cancel, but the progress bar continued upward. He double-tapped. Nothing changed.

The check broke through the firewall and spread both ways. As soon as Dozer captured the DOORS node, he clicked on the recycle bin. His light icon sauntered through the map. Once it cleared the data node, it wandered toward the recycle bin. The check devoured the data node and flooded the branch in hot pursuit. The light icon didn’t have a chance. It got captured soon after.

An infobox popped up. It informed Dozer it had locked him out. He hung his head. His thick pulse rushed through the arteries in his neck.

Buttstroke chuckled to himself, and his posture relaxed. He looked over his shoulder at Model, and Model kept his eyes on his screen.

The DOORS control icon pulled Dozer’s focus to it like a magnet. Buttstroke held his gaze on Model far too long for comfort. He broke away from his staring to notice Dozer staring at him. Imaginary doors closed on his oblivious face. The image made starburst sparks of pleasure in Dozer’s heart.