A
New Face Among Many – Chapter 2: The
Mouse Is In The House
Wait a minute... Izzy was sitting at his computer as usual, although
all was not right in his domain. Some new lines of code were being introduced
into his Unix server. "A hacker, but who, and why?" Never being one
to turn down a challenge, Izzy decided to locate this person.
By tapping into the phone
company's database it was Izzy's intention to find the general location of the
net connection.
Three hours and what
have I found? Izzy was walking down a
street checking and double-checking the address of the connection. He had just
passed a public phone book when he decided to try a new track. Izzy took out
his cell phone and dialed the phone number in the ISP and telephone companies'
databases.
*Ring*
The sudden ringing of the
pay phone behind Izzy startled him. Comparing the number of the phone against
the number on his computer screen Izzy realized he had been had.
Whoever this hacker is
they're no fool.
* * *
"…It's happened too many
times to be coincidence, Yolei. The pattern this person had developed indicates
that one of those two phones will be used."
Izzy had tracked many
different IP signatures and each one had led to different public phones. One
was even out-of-order and had been visibly re-wired. A map posted on a bulletin
board above Izzy's computer had assorted colors of thumbtacks pinned in a rough
circular pattern around an apartment building. Ten locations in total. Another
two areas had been circled in marker.
"Izzy. The rest of your
friends are here."
"Thanks, mom."
Izzy had invited the
younger Digidestined over to see if they could help him solve this problem. He
had sent them an e-mail apprising them of the situation so he wouldn't have to
explain it when they got to his home. Yolei had been the first to arrive, and
Davis, TK and Kari filed into Izzy's room.
TK and Kari took a seat on
Izzy's bed, while Davis stood beside Izzy and his computer. Yolei was on the
other side of the room at Izzy's server console.
"What's the map for Izzy,
and why is there a circle around Ken's apartment building?"
"Davis, do you know anyone
besides Ken who lives in that building?"
"Gee, Izzy, I'm not sure…"
"What about the girl Ken
introduced us to? Her name was Reliana, wasn't it?" TK pulled Kari closer,
ignoring the black look he got from Davis.
"That's her, isn't it?"
Davis was pointing to Izzy's laptop computer screen.
Each half of the monitor
displayed a view from a phone booth. The girl in question was approaching one
with a laptop in her hands.
"Just because she lives in
that building don't it mean it's her." Kari's line of reasoning was sound, but
no one was listening.
Izzy switched on a set of
speakers and was listening intently to the sounds accompanying Reliana's
movements.
* * *
Startled, Reliana turned to look behind her. For some
reason she couldn't shake the feeling that she was being watched.
* * *
Izzy was watching Reliana
closely. Her hands were quick and sure over the keyboard and she moved with the
grace of a soccer player.
"Izzy, I think you'd better
take a look at this." Yolei had been watching another monitor on the other side
of the room. Strange lines of code were inserting themselves through Izzy's
Unix server and the results could plainly be seen on the server's monitor.
"What is it, Yolei?" Izzy
turned just in time to see a mouse-like image appear on the server's monitor.
* * *
"Sorry, Izzy, but no one forbids the Mouse anything and
gets away with it. Good thing I got KillSwich from Firewall before I left."
Reliana inserted a disc into her laptop.
* * *
"NO!!!!!" Izzy dove for his cable modem with every
intention of pulling the plug. Just as he reached the cable connecter the
server monitor flickered and went black. The orange light that indicated hard
drive activity went dark also.
"Too late, Izzy." Yolei had gone pale. This was the first
time she had seen KillSwich in action and was surprised by the virus'
effectiveness.
"I'll kill her." Izzy was in a rage. He had just enough time to glance
at Reliana's image on his laptop screen before it too went black. "She will not
get way with this."
