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"Oh, uh, I haven't done anything."
"You're Scarletdragon01?"
I winced hearing the name I'd chosen to use on the dark web. "Yes."
"And Sweetsong21?" Ugh, so embarrassing.
"Yes. That was the handle I used to read the messages from them, so they probably know that's me."
"Right. I saw that. So Scarletdragon was actually closer than you thought. You'd made contact with Kenny's gang and received an invite to join his server."
"I did?" All I'd ever seen there were rejections and failures to connect. I didn't know I was anywhere close to breaking through.
"I'll show you. Have a seat." He wheeled over a leather chair for me, and I sat next to him. He started pulling up a bunch of code that I could barely read because it was moving so fast. He highlighted a message. "Right here. This is the invite for Scarletdragon to join his server. He thinks you're a buyer. You just needed to accept it, and you were in."
"Oh, cool. What next?" I asked.
"You like computers?" he asked me.
"Mmm-hmm. I was studying computer science in college."
"You're good. Don't give up." He had a very deep, rich voice, and his compliment caused heat to rise in my cheeks.
That was the first time anyone had ever told me I was good at computers. I knew I had an interest in it, but I'd never successfully programmed anything, unless you counted the few video games I'd designed. In the real world I'd been successful at nothing, and my adventures on the dark web had mostly been a disaster. "Can you show me more?"
"Okay, so this is the list of handles associated with his gang. You recognize any of them?"
I scanned the list quickly. "No. Wait. Cryptkeeper. That's Gavin, Mag's brother."
The other two guys stopped and shared a look with Kane. "You sure?" he asked me.
"I mean there could be more than one Cryptkeeper." I shrugged.
"So this was the guy that was threatening to ransom Kenny Zhao?" One of the other guys asked me, Locke, I think.
"He was planning to, but he said he wasn't making any progress."
"Let's see if we can find some proof of that." Kane started tapping his keys and scrolling through code.
"Will you show me how to do it?" I asked.
"Sure. I'll just talk you through what I'm doing. First, we're going to decrypt what we have from Kenny then we're going to set up a parallel account that mimics his to see how it would look if it were running correctly. That will help us see what software we might need to get through his defenses."
I sat next to him for most of the morning and tried to follow along. He talked less and less, and I lost track of all the steps. He asked me a few questions about Gavin that I didn'treally know the answer to, and around midday, my stomach started to growl. Fiona had said she would be in the office if I wanted to drop by for lunch, and I needed a break. So I stepped away and asked Stella where Fiona's office was located.
Stella brought some sandwiches, and we joined Fiona at the end of a different hallway for lunch. Her office was the opposite of the tech room. There were no screens at all, lots of live plants, and warm shades of green and taupe on the walls. She had soft, cushy couches, and she didn't even have a desk. It was set up like a living room with a coffee table in the center.
We chatted during lunch and then Stella excused herself saying she had to get back to the front desk.
"What's on your mind, Wren. I can tell you want to ask me something." Fiona clasped her hands together as she sat opposite me on the couch.
"I've been thinking about how you mentioned hypnotherapy."
She nodded.
"Does that really work? Like do you really hypnotize people?"
She leaned back and smiled. "It's not like you would think or maybe you've seen where people go into a trance and have their minds controlled like robots. It's more of a heightened state where your brain is more receptive to healing. You remain in control, but you also surrender to the process to facilitate the purpose."
