BENEDETTI TOLD THEM about the moments he had spent during the attack on Fifth Avenue. He tried to remember the conversation between President Kenan and his adversary, but his tired mind did not allow him much success. Clooney, not very content with just listening, insisted on looking for more information, invading government websites and their organizations. Until he became very frightened:
— What ?
Martin and Carl Benedetti turned their attention to the nerd imperative.
— What happened? Did you find out anything? — Martin asked.
— An access. An invasion, I think... — Brad said, deeply surprised, but even disappointed.
One of the programs he ran for security displayed an important warning on his laptop screen. He continued:
— This is an application I developed, which monitors my connection and detects any kind of remote activity on the network. Someone tried to find out who I am...
— And did you succeed? — asked Martin.
Benedetti remained silent, as he understood nothing about the matter.
"I don't think so," Clooney replied.
— So there's no reason to panic, right?
— How could he not? He found me! And that's already a big problem! When you're using three different security protocols and someone bypasses that, it's certainly worrying! I use two connections that basically download only half of the information each and the third one monitors and joins the content in the final stage, all masked!
— And what does that mean?
— I turn into a ghost! Practically no system would be able to even detect my presence while I access all the content!
— Every horny teenager's dream!
Clooney laughed at Benedetti's joke.
Martin didn't understand much beyond old Benedetti what his almost insane companion was talking about. Brad Clooney was typing codes and information madly on the screen, trying to figure out where the access had come from, but, laughing, he commented:
— He may have found me, but he won't be able to get past my own version of 3DES! I call it 3DESM, with 384-bit keys and Clooney at the end. Slow, but effective!
Clooney was crazily dissecting those digits and the two watched with some horror, until he exclaimed:
— I found the bastard! Did you think I wouldn't find you?
Martin stood near the computer to see what he had done.
— Let's see, let's see... — Clooney said, accessing the machine that had invaded his computer. — The guy is a noob , it's been a long time since I've done such an easy invasion! Hmm... I already understand what he did...
— What did he do? Tell me!
— This appears to be a public place... He accessed it from a public place! You want to make fun of me? You son of a...!
— Tell me, what do you have there?
— Well, there's not much, — he said, investigating the place. — wait! This file has your name on it!
A file on the network location had the name Danny Martin. Brad Clooney hesitated for a moment, thinking it might be a trap, but, impressed by the "coincidence" of his partner's name being there, he couldn't resist and opened the document. A text appeared:
"THERE IS NO OTHER CHANCE. JAVA STREET END ON THE LEFT. ALONE, BECAUSE ONLY YOU WILL GET OUT ALIVE..."
Clooney, who previously thought it was a botched job by someone with little ability, was now stunned by the situation:
— So, this means he didn't want to hack into my machine, he wanted to...
— ...I just wanted to send a message... — Carl added.
— Amazing. — Brad said after a whistle of admiration.
—But why so much work? — asked Benedetti.
— I don't know, maybe so as not to be found by others... — Martin said in monotone.
— It makes some sense. — Clooney agreed.
—And do you think it's worth going? — asked Carl Benedetti.
Martin ran his hand through his hair thoughtfully with a jovial expression. Then he replied:
— In the absence of options, this remains to be the best...
His friends did not show approval of his risky decision. Martin continued:
— The way things are going, I don't have much of a chance of getting out alive anyway. If I'm going to die, I don't want to sit around and wait for it, but I need to get these videos to Greg.
— That's easy...
Brad Clooney zipped the files and sent them to Greg's smartphone and said:
— Now it's up to him...