"SOLO"

By: W. Scott Petersen

0

He always worked alone. He never helped anyone else and he never asked for others to help him. He did not identify himself by a handle, but the other hackers and crackers called him "Solo". He was a ghost. There was only one person who knew his identity and that was himself; he was a true maverick. He was very, very good. But, the ICE was cold today. His Bots could not get past their defenses. It was like they knew he was coming. They did. He was impressed. After all, it was only the second time he had attacked this particular facility. He lamented on his netrunning skills. He needed to improve them. He was good, but he needed an edge. No, not implants. He needed something more; something esoteric. He turned off the light and closed his eyes, resting his head on the pillow on the couch. "Music," he said, "jazz, volume 4." The digital sound quietly embraced him as he drifted off to sleep.

1

"Good morning. It is time to wake up," a pleasant young female voice spoke clearly yet softly. As he arose from the couch, he cracked his back, then headed off to the shower. He put on his dark gray suit, with his antique Mickey Mouse tie. Ever since Disney was hit by the Halcyon Virus in '22, their entire organization had been trying to rebuild their dynasty to what it was at the turn of the century. He liked to dress in a suit and tie. Maybe it was his ego. A suit commanded respect. He grabbed his deck and headed out to the tube. His commute on the subway gave him just enough time to review his portfolio and catch up on the stock market highlights of the day. The Digital Broadcast Network had revolutionized the cellular Internet channel industry. Now, DBN had over 4000 specialty channels that could be accessed by most cyberdecks. Today, he was listening to the morning Bloomberg report. A few minutes later he had arrived at his intermediate destination.

2

He exited the train and headed up to get an espresso at the Garden, a local cyber café. He sat outside, opened up his cyberdeck and watched the vid-feed from Wall Street as the market started trading. He was interested in commodities today. He was reviewing his investments in gold, silicon, corn, and oil. He twisted his mouth in disgust as the corn prices dropped by a few pennies. "Ouch," he said aloud. He looked up in embarrassment as he realized what he had done. No one heard him. He finished his espresso and headed to the Mall, a huge complex of shops, restaurants, apartments, and offices. It even had a full-scale amusement park entirely underground with life-like overhead illumination from sunrise to sunset. Today, the planetarium was his ultimate destination.

3

The planetarium was a huge domed arena that could seat up to 5,000 people. Each seat had its own sound and HUD controls that could be tuned to virtually any language and a variety of programs that were simultaneously played throughout the day. The seats also had an IR port to download that day's presentation into a cyberdeck. It was mainly used for educational purposes, but today Solo was using it to retrieve secret information. A few months ago he had intercepted a coded message from one hacker to another. "The secret is in the stars," the message had said. He traced its origin to the planetarium. The next day he spent all day at the planetarium downloading each program into his deck. That evening he analyzed each program for encrypted or encoded messages. As he had suspected, there were several pieces of key information in one of the programs.

4

The information wasn't much. It looked to be a few passwords and access port addresses. Now came the fun part; trying to find out what the information could do for him. After a few more trips to the planetarium, Solo was able to determine that there were a group of hackers called the Mourning Angels of Death. MAD was a loose organization bent on the destruction of the monetary system of the world. They thought they were an idealistic group of cybersaviors who were going to save the world from the evil capitalist elitist. He thought they were a bunch of cyberidiots who had absolutely no idea how to harness the power of the Net. His hacking had made him a virtual millionaire. He was an expert at skimming funds, stocks, and commodities from the banks, stock markets, and other financial institutions; without ever being caught. Sometimes his transactions were identified as being hacked, but he never left enough evidence for even the most experienced and prestigious law enforcement officials to find him. "These guys are morons," he thought. "They're going to destroy everything I've worked for over the past two years." He took it personally. He was about to make MAD very angry.

5

Solo had an idea that came to him while researching a small software firm that guaranteed it could find any virus "or your money back". It was an omen. He would write an undetectable virus that would scan for hacking and cracking by MAD members, and intercept the attacks. The attacks would then be transferred back to his zeroed cyberdeck at home. He would trace and analyze everything and prepare to attack their headquarters. It was funny, he thought, that now he was actually writing something to protect the very bank that he was hacking just a month ago. The first draft of the virus took him about a week to write. The first time he sent it to the bank, it didn't take long for the Net population to be warned about the virus. It took him another month researching computer and biological viruses before he completed one that was undetectable. Within 24 hours of releasing the virus he was receiving MAD data on his deck at home.

6

Today's visit to the planetarium was more routine than anything else. He had enough information to hack into their main facility. He just needed to find a "quieter" way in. He was really looking forward to his meeting with Jonathan D. Sandling, the President of Sands International Bank of Commerce. He had sent "J.D." a few e-mails about his doings and undoings. He was about to make Mr. Sandling the deal of a lifetime. He had made a lot of money off of SIBC and he was about to again. His visit was to take place at an-upscale café in the Mall. We would reveal to J.D. that MAD was on the verge of crippling his entire $33.5 trillion organization. Solo knew he could stop it with his virus. All he wanted was $1 billion. On top of that, J.D. would have the recognition of having thwarted MAD and exposing them to the public.

7

The meeting with J.D. Sandling went well that afternoon. They mutually agreed to a fee for services rendered. Solo could retire. They put their plan in place that afternoon and set a press conference for the next morning. Solo would provide the proof and SIBC would place $800 million in a bank account of his choice. He felt a warmth that he had not felt in a long time. The business of hacking is lonely and only so much self-worth can be extracted from such covert activity. Now, he felt as if he was doing something right. Of course, he was also quite happy to be paid and did not feel that taking the $800 million degraded his chivalrous efforts.

8

That evening he started his quest. He was deliberate, stealthy, and sly. He knew enough information about their organization to act as one of their members. He kept an eye on the bank all night. There were no attempts to attack the system that night, but there was a flurry of activity at the other banks where his virus was located. Then, just before dawn, nothing. It was like their entire organization shut down overnight, literally. It was nearly daylight. Just then he heard a strong rapping at his door. "Of course," he said aloud as the adrenaline started rushing through his veins. It was then that he realized who had been watching him all this time. Double-crossed by the leader of MAD, J.D. Sandling. Almost all of MAD's activities had been stored on his deck at home. They were going to make it look like he was MAD. They were bashing down the door. His mind went into overdrive. He began deleting the viruses at every bank and immediately started streaming the intercepted MAD attacks back out into the Net; cybersuicide.

9

Solo was sentenced to death by electrocution. Just as the governor was about to pull the switch, the entire geographical region was blacked out. Solo was given a lethal injection later that night. To this day, no one knows who was responsible for the blackout. That evening, J.D. stood on his balcony while his home was lit by the generator in his garage. He surveyed the dark countryside, smoking his cigar. "Solo," he said aloud. Then he shook his head and stared up at the stars. He looked at the lone bright North Star. "Solo," he said again, "you just got a constellation named after you." The banks never recovered, not even SIBC. There was world-wide anarchy, war, and eventually global genocide. The earth would have to wait for the next ice age. A solitary planet destroyed by a ghost.

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(C) Copyright 1999, W. Scott Petersen. All rights reserved.

W. Scott Petersen is an author of Sci-Fi and Fantasy short stories and novels. He can be contacted by e-mailing to wsp@mediaone.net.