Chương 19: Chapter Eighteen

Thursday October, 27th I'd been poking around in Greg's home network again. The security had been set up by a professional but they'd made assumptions. They assumed that no one would want to get in as badly as I did. I found a vulnerability in the smart home system. His fancy internet connected thermostat had a big gaping security flaw. I made my way inside of his network from there and then into the home network and everything that it was connected to.

I could see his personal laptop, security cameras, mobile devices, his smart lights and tvs. The laptop though was where I found everything. The email had copies of everything, but here were the originals. Scans of signed documents, records of payments made through shell companies. A folder labeled insurance that contained enough blackmail to destroy half of the Harrison & Sons board, the mayor, and I'm fairly sure half of the wealthy folks in our city. Greg wasn't just a predator.

He has a careful, methodical sociopath. He kept transgressions like trophies and had his slimy tentacles in a lot of pies. I shuddered and shook my head trying to remove the mental image that my brain had just conjured up. Disgust only drove me deeper. I pulled files and mapped connections so that I could build myself a picture of just how rotten the foundation of Harrison & Sons Design really was. His history of exploitation started as a boy at boarding school. His father, Greg Sr.

was the first to pay off a family whose daughter was pulled from the boarding school for 'family reasons'. There were so many records that I felt sick. I moved things from his drive onto an external drive that I'd picked up at the store. The more files I transferred the more nauseated I became. My head was pounding and suddenly the window through which I was viewing Greg's computer began to glitch. The security feeds began flickering, pixelating and going out of focus.

I grabbed the last batch of proof and a blinding pain flashed through my vision before everything went dark. I existed outside of my body. The code was flowing around me like water, it was dense and intricate. I swam through it mindlessly and without effort. Something flickered in my peripheral vision. I turned toward it and caught only a glimpse of movement. I felt my body then, pulling me back as all of the hairs stood up on my neck. I felt the cool floor against my cheek.

Something had been there, something was watching me. I spun around looking desperately for my watcher. My breath hitched and I started panicking. LEVEL UP The voice rang out loudly through my head. It felt differently than it had before. I didn't feel ill, I wasn't in a pool of my own blood or in massive pain. I just felt aware. Aware and afraid. I sat up and the world around me came back into view. I pulled myself up off of the floor and rubbed at my shoulder.

I must've hit it when I passed out because it was a little sore. Greg's network! I needed to finish what I was doing and then break the connection. I sat down at my desk and found myself no longer able to connect into Greg's network. It's not that I had been kicked out per se… more like it was no longer available. And around me the code was everywhere. The walls, the furniture, the air itself, everything was underlaid with patterns that I could see as easily as I had been able to see colors.

What's more is that I could now activate it and deactivate code vision at will and the sections that I could manipulate, had manipulated in the past stood out as if marked in a bolder font than the rest. I quickly grabbed my journal and flipped to a fresh page. Level 4: Abilities: -Code vision: See code of the universe -Adjust color levels: Adjust color of objects -Adjust size and shape: Adjust size or shape of objects Warning Tiny bagels still seem to contain the same amount of calories as a regular sized bagel.

Do not eat multiple. -Digital manipulation Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings. -security systems: Bypassed -adjusting values: Multiple values adjusted through digital spaces. -Unlocked all premium subscriptions through smart TV: Better than Napster.

-Textile Tinkerer -Color and size: Bigger rug, colors easy to adjust -Texture needs work: More fibers or softer fibers still resulting in failure -Temperature control: perfect coffee -Plant manipulation murder: Don't change color of plants -Code Switch: Turn Code Vision off and on at will -Bold Values: Values I know how to adjust or have attempted to adjust in the past are now easier to spot. Symptoms: -Nausea -Headaches Triggering Event: -Greg's security system Questions to answer: - Who was watching me?

- What am I? Was I becoming a comic book hero? The masked vigilante, able to take down criminals without even leaving my apartment. Or was this more like The Sims and I had broken out of my npc state and could see and manipulate the world around me while everyone else was still being puppeted by some master overlord? I stared at the page for a long time. Sketches of symbols filled every inch of blank space. If I was looking at this from an outside perspective I'd look like that "aliens" meme guy.

I knew which symbols I could manipulate, especially now that they stood out. I had a list of symbols to avoid changing, things that tended to not go so well, or things that resulted in nothing happening other than waking up in a pile of my own blood. I thought about the lackluster job search, all of the fake jobs clogging up the real ones. AI reducing those real ones even further, and whether or not my severance would get pushed through and approved.

It was on par with what Greg made annually and I doubted it would make it through before I heard from the legal department explaining the clerical error. My phone buzzed and I picked it up before sending it to voicemail. My mother again. Each voicemail this week was more and more unhinged. Her voice increased another octave with every demand that I call her. I got the new voicemail notification and went ahead and played it on speaker.

"Samantha. This is your mother. I need you to call me. Your aunt Harriet told me that she heard from Janice at church that her husband's friend Bob worked at your company and that you got fired. Samantha I cannot believe you wouldn't tell me this. You let me find out from Harriet. You know how Harriet is. Samantha? I know you're there. Answer the phone Samantha. I sighed and drank an entire glass of water. My mouth was so dry.

We were in the age of cell phones and my mom still treated voicemail like an old answering machine connected to a house phone from my youth. But even my mom felt so distant from my mind, like a television show you might get back to sometime. I had a villain to stop. I had– My phone buzzed Kate: Ready to make costumes? Me: Sure. Kate: What should we be??? Me: Let me think about it. Me: Oh! Kate:??? Me: You finished up the latest in the Throne of Light, yeah? Kate: Yeah… Me: Well?! Kate: But who will be Aurora?

😉😉😉 Me: Oh. You can definitely be Aurora if you want. You're the dark haired one afterall. Kate: No, you can be Aurora… But only if I can be Malikai!!! Me: lol Kate: Fine. I'll be Celeste your trusty best friend.

"Work was awful today," Kate said later that evening when she called to vent.

"There was a staff meeting about the new direction the company is going in and the "restructuring". Everyone is pretending like everything is great and normal, but no one believes it.

"That sounds delightful."

"The worst part is I can tell exactly who is faking it. I walked into the conference room and," she struggled to figure out what to say.

"I don't know how to explain it. It was like everyone's anxiety was choking me."

"Julia is furious."

"She told you that?"

"No. I could just tell. Everyone is just so stressed out. I've got a massive headache from the whole thing."

"Still?"

"Yeah. I've been living on ibuprofen but it barely touched it." She paused, "Anyway. Costumes. We good to go?"

"I will go out and get the fabric tomorrow."

"Girrrrrrrrl. This is going to be fun. Sorry, we'll miss Wine About It Fridays tomorrow. Aunt May couldn't find anyone else to take her to her appointment."

"Oh, it's no big deal. I'll see you Sunday."

"Alright, bye." Kate had always had a knack for reading people. That was one of the things that made her amazing at her job. And these days everyone at H&S was probably absolutely overwhelming her need for everyone around her to be happy. Greg could wait. He had been getting away with this for years. A few more days wouldn't matter. I'd figure out what to do about the whole situation. I promised Kate, and she really needed me. I'd definitely loop her in, I just had to figure out how.