Ethan powered on his laptop, a device he had modded for a singular purpose. As the screen flickered to life, the familiar boot sequence of Kali Linux materialized before his eyes, displaying a series of command-line messages. His fingers danced across the keyboard as he entered the password and username. With that done, he swiftly entered a command in the terminal.
msfconsole
He pressed enter, and the boot sequence continued in the bash terminal, initializing the familiar Metasploit framework—his go-to tool. As the series of initializing messages appeared and the lines of code started reverberating on his screen with the constant flicker, a wave of memories rushed over him. He remembered, as a ten-year-old, returning home from the fourth grade, brimming with excitement to show his mother the medal he had won for the first prize he secured.
Ethan swung open the door, proudly displaying the first prize medal he had earned in his class. 'Mom, look! I won first prize,' he exclaimed. However, instead of a joyful response, his ears were met with a tirade of unhinged words and anger.
'This is your fault!' The words rang out laced with bitterness. "You conceived when I wasn't ready! You ruined my life!" Each word felt like a lash.
His mother stood there, a visible reflection of his father's behavior. Tears coursed down her cheeks, leaving glistening trails in their wake. Her eyes were puffy, a telltale sign of the distress she felt. She held her arms close to her chest as if trying to protect herself from the onslaught of words. Her gaze was fixed on the ground, unable to meet his father's furious stare. Her whole body trembled, quivering under the weight of his rage.
In the midst of the verbal storm, he noticed his father's eyes locked on her, filled with a twisted mix of anger and frustration. The man's voice reverberated with the sheer force of his words, a cruel symphony of blame and cruelty.
"Che, this happened because you were born!" His father's voice echoed as he noticed Ethan. His father's frustration and anger were palpable; the words were a bitter reminder of their strained relationship. Quickly, he hurled the sandal he was holding at Ethan's face before storming out, the door slamming shut behind him.
"Mom, Mom!" Ethan hurried toward his mother, his face filled with concern. "What happened to you?" he asked, his worry evident in his voice. 'Why did he come today?' He was already shocked to the core to see his father, but at that moment, instead of finding solace, his mother started beating him in frustration and shouted, "This all happened because of you!" The blows continued as she vented her anger and frustration on Ethan.
The day Ethan came into this world should have been a celebration, but instead, it set in motion a chain of events that would forever shape his existence. The room that was meant to be filled with coos of joy was instead overshadowed by his mother's exhausted sighs and his father's silent desperation. From the moment his cries echoed through the hospital walls, a heavy cloud of uncertainty hung over his family. His father's eyes, once filled with hope, were now clouded by the weight of lost dreams and dashed expectations. With every medical bill that piled up and every creditor's call that went unanswered, the cracks in their marriage deepened, and Ethan became an unwitting symbol of their unraveling life.
On that fateful day, when his father's carefully constructed financial stability crumbled under the weight of a fraudulent scheme, Ethan's world shifted on its axis. The very foundation of security that his family had known shattered, leaving them in the debris of broken promises and dashed hopes. Their once-comfortable home was replaced by the harsh reality of financial ruin, and the warm embrace of love was exchanged for the cold, unforgiving streets. As his father's shoulders slumped under the burden of his own failures, he turned his gaze towards the innocent bundle in his wife's arms, a bundle that now represented everything he had lost.
Abandonment wasn't just an act; it was the manifestation of a father's inability to bear the weight of his own inadequacies. The bitter taste of resentment tainted every tear-stained memory, as his father chose to lay blame on an innocent infant rather than confront his own shortcomings. The curse of bad luck wasn't a label Ethan chose, but it became a heavy cloak he wore as he navigated a world marked by scarcity and strife.
After that day, his mother's laughter became scarce, and her attention to Ethan grew distant. His father's presence was marked by a cloud of alcohol, and their interactions were strained and brief. Ethan often found solace in solitude, longing for the warmth of his mother's affection, which he rarely received. The strained dynamics in their household left him grappling with emotions that were difficult to express.
Apart from providing him with necessities and sending him to school, his mother hardly interacted with Ethan, leaving him with a lonely and distant childhood memory. Then, one day, his mother passed away, her tear-dried eyes etched in his memory. Despite her shortcomings, He cherished her as everything he ever had, as he had never experienced genuine family love.
As the memories faded away, a single speck of tear rolled down Ethan's cheek as he returned to reality. With a heavy sigh, he muttered, "Why did I think of this all of a sudden?" He looked at the screen; the initializing of his command line on screen had ended, and now he was faced with the most challenging task of his life.
Ethan, now at the age of twenty-one, bore dark circles from countless sleepless nights. His unkempt hair cascaded down to his neck; and despite being in his twenties, not a single hair of beard adorned his jawline. Dressed in regular black jeans and a white t-shirt that reeked of sweat and bore yellow stains, it was evident that he rarely bothered to wash his clothes.
His nimble fingers flew across the keyboard as he sat on a broken wooden chair and a makeshift table that he had assembled using materials he had collected from the abandoned building where he currently resided. The building, once intended to be a residential area, was never completed due to illegal land scams orchestrated by the company, and currently, it was going through a legal battle.
So it was the perfect place he had found to start his hacking endeavors; the whole building was surrounded by weeds and plants, and Ethan had carved out a route through the bushes that led him to his apartment, where he was the only one who knew this secret way to enter the building, or, you could say, no one bothered to enter the building premises.
He accessed wireless internet through his dongle, and to shield his identity from the ISP, he built his own VPN backdoor. Despite VPNs provided by companies and their claims regarding data security, they track all the records, and for tasks like this, Ethan couldn't trust any VPN providers. So, after countless sleepless nights of research, he hacked a popular VPN client protocol to create an untraceable connection, and although it was illegal, for him, its functionality was what mattered most.
If you were to ask him whether creating his own VPN was a difficult task, he would have laughed and replied, "Well, it's way simpler than talking to or approaching a girl."
Ethan, now with all the security measures in check and the masking of his laptop's MAC address, felt fully prepared as he began writing the commands to initialize the hacking process. While he had only dabbled in minor hacks in the past, like obtaining free items online or exploiting illegal gambling websites, the task he was about to perform was on a whole different level.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
His target for the day was none other than OmniTech Industries, a multi-billion-dollar company with fields in construction and various manufacturing units. You might wonder why Ethan chose this particular company. Well, it was because of the illegal foundation upon which OmniTech Industries had been built. You see, in today's world, it's not uncommon for companies to have a questionable past, with even large Fortune 500 companies involved in unethical practices, especially in certain regions like Africa. However, there was something particularly sinister about OmniTech Industries that caught his attention.
Before the company reached its current size and became renowned, its founder, Richard Emer, was involved in illegal land sales and various other chain marketing scams, victimizing his father in the process. Due to this despicable man, his life turned into a living hell. After meticulously tracing past routes and investigating the person behind his father's culprit, He discovered that OmniTech Industries was a result of Emer's misdeeds.
Ever since he learned the truth about the mastermind behind the miseries, he kept a keen eye on his target, Richard Emer. He spent countless hours conducting reconnaissance and foot-printing of the company, gathering extensive server details, all in preparation for this crucial moment.
His fingers danced across the keyboard as he entered the command in the terminal to conduct a preliminary scan of servers and their networks.
nmap -sS -T4 192.168.1.100
After the scan, Ethan reviewed the results, analyzing the open ports and services on the target server. His goal was clear: he needed to find an entry point that would allow him to bypass the company's formidable firewall. With the details from the scan gathered, he jumped into a relentless search for specific exploits that he could take advantage of in the services and software running on the target server. To achieve this, he used the formidable power of the Metasploit framework.
As Ethan continued to decrypt the discovered vulnerabilities, he set his sights on using the malware he had created to infiltrate the company's robust firewall. The firewall was like an impenetrable fortress, an Everest standing tall before him, yet he remained undeterred, fully focused on decrypting the firewall with his malware.
"Come on, come on, I can do this," he whispered to himself as his fingers danced on the keyboard.
After several nerve-wracking attempts, an alert message flashed on the screen, and seeing the alert, his heart sank. The firewall was resilient, and he was one step away from being discovered.
Suddenly, a breach failed with the message "Firewall breach attempt detected. Security alert raised."
Ethan, now completely frustrated, shouted, "No, not now!"
But even though his digital footprint was detected and an alert was raised, Ethan at this moment did not care; even if he had to go to jail today, he was ready for it. He had only one goal in mind: to bring the founder, Richard Emer, on the road. Since the malware attempt failed to completely crack the firewall without raising a breach alert, he decided to attempt a brute-force attack, even if it meant getting caught.
Hoping to directly force entry into the server, his fingers danced across the keyboard as he typed.
Hydra -l usernames.txt -P passwords.txt 192.168.0.100 ftp
Back at OmniTech Industries headquarters, a Security Analyst shouted, "We've got an unauthorized intruder! Tracing the source now!"
The company's security team had already detected the unauthorized attempt from an unknown origin and activated their countermeasures. The security analyst team was determined to trace the source of the intrusion back to its origin. Amidst all of this, he continued to use his malware in an attempt to gain access.
As Ethan was using his VPN to maintain his anonymity, the security team deployed sophisticated tracking techniques, and their virtual breadcrumbs led them closer and closer to his location. The team leader shouted to his team and spoke loudly, "We're getting closer; the source is coming from an abandoned building on the outskirts of Rushville."
As the security team desperately tried to contain the breach, Ethan's adrenaline surged as he knew he had to act quickly to complete his mission. He had to transfer the funds and expose the scams to the world before the servers were shut down. He remained focused and determined to see it through until the end, even though the security team had already raised the alarms.
The security analyst spoke urgently, "I am shutting down the servers now! But the hacker is still inside!"
Another Security Analyst chimed in, "He must have found a way to bypass our firewall; I am trying to cut off his access."
The Security Team Leader responded, "This is an unprecedented breach. Keep trying to track him down, and make sure the FBI is on their way."
Ethan had anticipated the response he would get and was prepared for this moment. As the servers started to shut down, he executed malware that would keep the fund transfer process ongoing while simultaneously publishing the scams and their victims on the web, even during the server closures.
Amid chaos at the company's headquarters, Ethan watched as the funds started to flow to the victims. The transfer process was now automated, ensuring that the money would reach those who had suffered at the hands of scammer Richard Emer as the company went to ruins. His face reflected a mix of relief and anxiety. He had achieved his goal, but now the stakes were higher than ever. His identity was no longer that of just a skilled hacker; he had become a digital vigilante, and the FBI was on the hunt.
Ethan sighed to himself in contempt: "It's done. The victims will finally get what they deserve."
Then he got up from the broken wooden chair. He could hear the wailing sirens and the approaching helicopter from a distance. His heart started racing as he saw that his task was 100 percent complete. He took out the wallet from his pocket and retrieved the photo. Then he threw the wallet on the terrace floor, followed by his bag, laptop, dongle, chargers, wooden table, and chair, making a pile. Once done, he set everything on fire, leaving no trace behind.
As he prepared himself for the impending consequences and was about to flee from sight, he couldn't shake the feeling that he was being watched. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end, and his instincts screamed at him to be on high alert.
But as he was about to leave the site, a red sniper light fell on Ethan, and he heard the FBI shouting for him to put his hands up. "FBI! Put your hands up!" Ethan, now surrounded, held his hands up high, but he remained unfazed by the impending consequences. In a mutter, he spoke, "I hope this will finally put an end to my father's constant blame."
As the FBI surrounded him, his hands held high, clutching a nearly faded photo he had just taken out of the wallet, a fire was burning down the possessions that he had ignited. Suddenly, as the FBI closed in and the helicopter's strong wind roared, the photo slipped from Ethan's clutch and fell into the pit of fire, starting to burn its edges.
"No, no," Ethan panicked as he quickly crouched down to grab the photo. The FBI shouted again, "Don't move!", But it was too late. Ethan promptly went towards the fire to retrieve the photo, but this sudden haste from him resulted in his life as a bullet went past through his chest, piercing his organs.
"Aaaaaahhhhhh," Ethan cried in pain.
A fountain of blood spurted out from his chest, and Ethan cried loudly in pain and anguish as he fell on the terrace floor with a loud thud, his hand holding the photo that had almost caught fire at the edges; the ashes covered the face, but he could still make out from whatever it had left that it was a photo of a female whom he clutched in his hands.
Ethan let out a huge sigh as he looked at the photo with tears rolling down his cheeks, knowing that this was his final moment as he lay on the ground covered with his blood, wounded and surrounded by the approaching FBI team. With his last strength, he stammered a few words, his emotions overwhelming him.
"I hope you are in a good place, Mom," he whispered, his voice choked with sadness and regret. "Only if the situation was different, would you have still loved me?" Tears started rolling down the ground as he continued whispering, "I wish I could meet you again soon."
As the sirens continued ringing, Ethan clutched the photo tightly as if he were trying to hold onto the fleeting memories of a love he had always yearned for. With a final deep breath, he closed his eyes, finding solace in his last moments. At least in his final act, he had achieved a form of redemption for himself from his father's constant blame.
Ironically, in his final moments, Ethan found himself within the very building owned by Richard Emer, the owner of OmniTech Industries—the very place he had chosen to carry out his hacking endeavors and take his revenge against the man who caused so much misery in his life. As he lay on the floor, bleeding and surrounded by the approaching FBI team, Ethan couldn't help but chuckle bitterly at the irony of the situation.
With his last ounce of strength, Ethan whispered, 'I love you, Mom,' and then embraced the darkness.