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Where the fuck is this asshole?

Maybe I should be more worried about who I’m about to meet. Technically, it could be some kind of undercover cop, or maybe someone working for Adley. He’s absolutely had people killed for less than poking around in their records.

What I should be doing is following up on the background checks that Bennet asked for this morning. I’m running each name and picture through every database I know of, and it’s likely still going to be running for the next couple hours, but I’m out here wasting time instead of working.

Mostly I’m just pissed, and maybe a little intrigued. Sitting down at the edge of the park fountain, I thumb back through the messages I received this morning.

MM0Undercover919: I think we can help each other. Meet me at the Cross Park fountain at 11:30 today. East side, facing the boardwalk.

TB_EXPLOITS: Who is this and how did you get this number?

MM0Undercover919: See Attachment. See you at 11:30.

The attachment was a portion of Jackson Adley’s bank records that I’ve been trying to get into for months. This tells me two things: One, that this guy knows who I am, where to find me, and that I've been sticking my nose where it doesn’t belong. And two, he has the access that I need.

I check my watch. 11:32. The park is fairly empty on a weekday. There are only a few people jogging or heading to the boardwalk for lunch.

I’m getting frustrated and ready to leave when my phone chimes.

MM0Undercover919: Change of plans. Go to the boardwalk, turn left. I’ll be at Grant’s Hot Dog Stand.

You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.

It takes a good five minutes to reach the boardwalk, and another two to reach the dingy-looking cart with a yellow umbrella. I’m assuming this is the right place because there aren’t any other hot dog stands on this end of the boardwalk, and the cheerful-looking man standing behind the cart is wearing an apron that says “Grant”.

So now it’s nearly ten minutes after the time we agreed to meet, and I’m getting pretty upset? this guy is wasting my time. There’s no one here except Grant, the dirty hot dog peddler, and a small, mousy-looking woman intently eating a relish-covered hot dog the size of her face. She catches me looking at her and grins shyly, like I caught her doing something bad. The expression does odd things to my stomach and my cock twitches.

My physical reaction to her surprises me. Flirting is not something that comes naturally to me, but neither do most normal forms of human interaction. My last girlfriend was someone I met playing an online video game, and it was, unsurprisingly, a complete disaster. I’m not proud of it.

“You know that shit is terrible for you, right?” Nice, , good start, criticize her eating habits.

“Mmm hmm, but it’s sooo goooood.” The way she talks about that hot dog, nearly moaning in appreciation of the nasty, dirty tube of whatever byproducts and poison they put in those things, is almost enough to make me want a bite. Of her.

“Do you want one?” My mouth opens a little. Her question catches me in the middle of my brief spiral into being a complete pervert. She looks so innocent and unassuming, which somehow makes it worse and oh-my-god, I’m a bad person.

Clearing my throat and pretending I wasn’t just picturing her salivating over a different kind of tube-shaped meat in her mouth, I chuckle awkwardly. “Uh, no. But thank you. I’m a vegetarian.”

“Interesting.”

“Is it?”

She shrugs. “You weren’t what I was expecting.”

“Excuse me?” It takes my brain too long to catch up, but when I finally do, my eyes nearly pop out of my head. “Wait. What?”

“I didn’t expect such an accomplished hacker to be so… I don’t know what the word is. But you don’t look like you spend much time in your mother’s basement.”

“My mother is dead,” is all I can manage to say. This can’t be?

“Mine too. So, uh, do you mind if we walk while we talk?”

I’m still trying to process.

“I’m sorry… you’re ‘MM0Undercover919’?”

“Yup,” she says, popping the p with emphasis. “Try not to look so surprised.”

“Sorry, I? ”

“Need to examine your own biases?”

She doesn’t seem angry or irritated. If anything, she seems amused as she gives me a quick once over before turning her back and continuing down the boardwalk. She doesn’t wait to see if I’m following, leaving me standing open-mouthed in her wake.

Who is this woman?

Shaking myself out of it, I lengthen my stride to catch up to her. “Okay, so are you going to tell me how you tracked me down?”

“I caught an unusual signature logging into The Adley Corp. systems, followed it back to a pretty recognizable handle from the HackWeb forum.

“And you were in the Adley systems because…”

“I work there. I’m one of Mr. Adley’s personal assistants.”

Fuck. My hand reaches for my phone. I need to tell Bennet we’ve been caught.

She reaches out, resting a hand on my arm. “Relax, Bugs. We’re on the same side.”

I pause but give her an incredulous look. “Bugs?”

“That’s how you do things, right? You exploit bugs to get access into the code that gives you a backdoor into the systems you hack.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I published the bug you used to get in.” She rolls her eyes. “I’ve been on HackWeb a lot longer than you have. The way you used that bug exploit was clever, though. You’re good.”

My mind sifts through the memories of various things I’ve tried to get into The Adley Corporation systems. My boss, someone I very much admire, has trusted me with his interest in finding concrete evidence against the owner of the company. He is positive that Jackson Adley is involved in some kind of extortion or corruption, and he’s putting together a file strong enough to take him down.

“I’ve never seen your handle before.”

“You’re telling me you only use one handle? Aren’t you a security specialist? You think I walk around in real life sharing my information?”

Well, that’s why I wasn’t able to dig up any information about the username. It’s irritating me that I can’t decide if the way she’s ribbing me is annoying or enamoring. I’m not used to strangers having the upper hand, nor am I very used to not being the smartest person in a conversation. Instead of uncomfortable, it’s weirdly refreshing… and arousing.

“So what is it you want from me?” I also want to ask where we’re going. We left the boardwalk a while ago, and have just been walking along a weed-strewn, sandy path to a remote beach access point.

It’s probably stupid of me to be here at all, to be having this conversation. No matter how good of a hacker this woman is, she never would have found me in real life if I hadn’t answered and agreed to meet. I was in no danger until I set foot on that boardwalk. But I couldn’t resist the lure of knowing who it was that tracked my signature and how they found my profile.

I’m not really a hacker. I’m just a cyber security specialist with too much time on his hands. I do this for fun? to see what I can do, how far I can go. It’s the thrill that gets me. Using defects, or “bugs”, to get into various systems is my go-to method and something I’ve become a bit known for online. Typically, I just break in and leave a little calling card for whoever might come across it, just to show I’d been there. Completely untraceable, of course.

I never left a calling card in The Adley Corporation systems, but she still traced me. I didn’t want anyone to know I’d been there, not yet. She’s good. And that intrigued me enough to step outside my comfort zone and follow my curiosity.

“I want to know why you were trying to break into TAC. It didn’t seem like you were after money.”

I bristle. “I’m not a thief. I was looking for… information.”

“About Jackson Adley?”

My eyes narrow. I can’t confirm or deny what I’m after without putting my employer in danger. But she is sharp, observant. And she’s looking at me like she sees right through me.

Without waiting for me to answer, she gets to the point. “I’d like to work together on a little project I’ve been working on.”

“And that is?”

She stops walking, turning to me with a fierce gleam in her eye.

“Taking Jackson Adley down and burning BioCere, Inc. to the ground.”