AN: Thanks to Marvel-Tolkien Fangirl, jakefan, and Qweb for reviewing the last chapter.
As soon as the hard drive had finished cloning, Scott went to detach the connector. However, he thought better of it and instead started typing into the tablet. He quickly accessed the saved surveillance data and spliced together 24 hours of video data in which no one was visible in the apartment. When he was finished, he synced it up with the current time and set it to play on a continuous loop. He also embedded a virus in the surveillance program which would activate if someone tried to tamper with his looped feed. At the same time, he loaded a worm into the computer which he could activate remotely. Finally, Scott walked around to the back of the laptop and located the receiver for the phone tap in the apartment. He peeled it open, reversed two of the wires, and attached a tiny remotely activated explosive device to it.
Looking for more mayhem he could cause, Scott reached down and searched around in a few of his utility belt compartments. At last his hand felt a tiny square. He pulled the bug out and started looking for somewhere to plant it. Finally, he decided to pull up the corner of the laptop cover and plant it directly on the motherboard. Scott attached the wires appropriately and programmed the bug to send the data to his tablet via the internet every 24 hours. Satisfied, Scott detached the connector from the computer and started to reset the size to normal. However, he quickly realized how useful such a cable could be, and simply shrunk the entire thing as is to fit into his utility belt.
No sooner had Scott finished than he heard the sound of a key being put in a lock and turned. He took a running leap off the table just as the door opened and a man walked in. Scott landed on his feet and spun into a roll. As soon as his feet were back under him, he pushed himself up and ran to the wall. Looking around desperately for a hiding place, he noticed a gap in the molding and crawled into the wall. As soon as he was hidden, he turned around to look out through the crack and check whether he had been noticed.
It did not appear that the man had noticed him. He had walked across to the card table, sat down at the chair in front of the computer, and started typing. From his vantage point, Scott could see that he was wearing dark blue pants and a light blue shirt. The man took the baseball cap off his head and set it down on the edge of the table to his left. Scott could make out a logo that looked like a mop and broom crossed in the shape of an X. He recognized it as the apartment maintenance company's logo.
Scott carefully made his way through the space behind the molding toward the outside wall of the apartment, the direction toward the nearest electrical outlet. When he reached the outlet, Scott pulled a different type of electronic listening device out of his utility belt along with his multi-tool. Careful not to electrocute himself, he cut through the insulation on the wires, attached the wires from his bug to the correct electrical wires, and set the bug up with the microphone facing out of the outlet. Scott also attached a wireless router to the bug and programmed it to send information to his tablet over the internet. When the bug was in place, Scott crawled back to the crack in the molding by which he had gotten behind the wall.
When he reached that crack, Scott wriggled out and looked up to check on the man by the computer. The man still had his back turned to where Scott was and did not seem to be paying any attention to him. Scott ran out from the wall and dove into the pile of garbage in the middle of the floor. His senses were immediately assaulted by the smell of stale pizza when he landed on a half-eaten slice of pizza. He pushed himself up with his hands, and they sunk up to his elbows into the pizza sauce and cheese. Scott groaned when a couple ants walked past him and started chewing on the pizza around him. Scott grabbed one ant's leg as it walked past, and mentally commanded it to pull him out of the pizza. When he finally felt the thin carpet under his chest, he let go of the ant and pushed himself to his feet. He was covered with old cheese. He looked around until he found an old used napkin. He walked over and started wiping the cheese off with a relatively clear corner of the napkin. Once he was satisfied, he quietly walked over to the edge of the garbage pile to look back out at the man at the table.
No sooner had he taken his place than he heard the apartment door open again and another man walked in. When Scott peeked out from his hiding spot, he saw that the newcomer was wearing a brown shirt with a company logo and khakis, with a brown hat pulled down over his eyes to conceal his face. He held a clipboard in his left hand.
"Any new developments, Bob?" the first man asked as soon as the door was shut.
Bob pulled his hat off and tossed it over onto the sleeping bags, followed by his over-shirt. "No new orders from the boss, if that's what you're asking," he reported, dropping the clipboard on the table and walking over to the small kitchen. Scott heard the refrigerator door open and close, followed by the sound of a can opening.
"Damn, I was hoping it'd be over by now."
"You saw the video, Josh," Bob told him, walking back into the room and taking a gulp from his beer. "The subject left last night with a duffel. Out of the parking lot he turned toward Stark Industries. This morning he called and told the girl he wasn't going to be home for a few days. He hasn't returned since. He must've done the deed last night. Now it's time for Phase 2."
Josh nodded his agreement before he pulled out a cell phone and pressed a speed dial before holding it to his ear. A few minutes later, he said, "Mr. Lang, we will assume that you've made your decision and you now have the card in your possession. To secure the doctor's safe return, place the card in a newspaper and leave it on the doormat just outside your apartment. When we verify the card, the doctor will be released." He closed the phone, put it on the table, and said, "Now, I guess we just have to sit back and wait for him to come back."
Scott pulled a Bluetooth receiver out of his utility belt and connected it to his tablet. He reached out from under the pile of garbage, pointed the receiver at Josh's phone, and pressed a button on the tablet. In under a minute he had downloaded everything from the phone onto his tablet. Satisfied with his work, Scott edged his way around several half-eaten pieces of pizza, a couple discarded Chinese takeout boxes, and some beer bottles to the other side of the pile of garbage to make his escape.
When Scott was as close to the balcony door as he could get under the garbage cover, he chanced a glance back at the men by the table. Josh was still working on his computer, but Bob seemed to be staring absentmindedly out the glass sliding balcony door. Unfortunately, Scott could see that his gaze was going out the window directly above the pizza box under which Scott was hiding.
Damn it, he thought, there's no way to get out without being seen. He looked around, trying to find an alternative exit. I need a distraction, he realized. Scott suddenly noticed the white noise of insect thoughts which had been buzzing at the back of his mind all day. He felt the presence of about a dozen different insects just within garbage pile, along with more flying around the room and hiding in the walls. Without hesitating, he mentally commanded every insect he could sense, "Attack."
"Hey!" Josh shouted in surprise, slapping his arm. "A mosquito just bit me."
At the same time, Bob screamed when he was stung by a bee. "Wait, what's going on!?" he yelled, pointing at the ground. A dozen ants had just crawled out of the pile of pizza boxes in a straight line toward the two men.
"What the hell!" Josh shouted, jumping up from the chair, knocking the table over as he did so. The computer clattered to the ground. The two men started backing away from the crowd of insects and trying to stomp on them when they got close. One of the men pointed at the balcony door with a shaking finger. On the other side of the glass was what looked like an entire nest of wasps, buzzing angrily and beating their wings against the glass. The two men immediately turned on their heels and fled into one of the bedrooms and slammed the door.
When the first mosquito was killed, Scott cringed as the mosquito's thoughts changed from gnawing hunger to excruciating pain and then were abruptly extinguished. However, as soon as he saw the men leave the living room, he made a break for the balcony door. He put his hands on the sliding door and started pushing it to the side. He felt his specially-textured gloves grip onto the smooth metal of the door. The door opened a crack, and Scott climbed out. As he did so, he heard the wasps jostling each other above his head in their frenzy to get into the apartment and carry out Scott's order. By the time Scott had left the apartment and pushed the door shut, the entire wasp nest had flown into the apartment. Scott smirked when he heard a pair of screams signifying that the two criminals had discovered that fact as well. Ignoring the battle brewing inside the apartment, Scott concentrated until he found the thought cluster he recognized as Harry on the other side of the apartment complex. He commanded Harry to fly over the apartment building and pick him up. A couple minutes later, the hornet flew directly over his head before circling around below the balcony. Scott jumped off the balcony onto its back. This time he timed the jump perfectly and landed directly on the saddle.
Scott sat on the roof ledge above his apartment with his legs dangling over the edge while he sifted through the data he'd gathered from the men in the apartment. The hornet was flying in circles a foot above his head, alert for any signs of danger.
It was over an hour before Scott finally found what he was looking for. He was checking through the data he'd pulled off the cell phone when he found a series of calls to and from the same number. Scott hacked into the cell phone company's system and uploaded a virus to track the phone's location and send it to him the next time it was used. Returning to the cloned computer hard drive, he found a rental agreement for a semi truck taken out by one of the men in the apartment under an alias. By checking police records Scott located the truck in question in Kansas City, Missouri.
"Well, Harry," he observed, looking up at the hornet, "it's not much, but at least it's a start."
Harry simply looked back down at him and tilted his head.