CHAPTER 14
"I don't get it, why was Bruce impersonating you?" Joe asked Frank ten minutes later. His eyes were on the road as he steered the wheel toward the street.
The Hardys and Liz were in the van, on their way to Datatronics, where Duncan worked.
Frank glanced on the dashboard, where he had placed the rubber mask that he had found in Bruce's room.
"He wouldn't, unless he's working for Morris or Massalski," Frank replied grimly. "I guess that's why he was at Phil's. He must have found out the chip is on the project board."
"So, the kidnapping was staged?" Liz suddenly asked. She was sitting at the back of the van.
"Maybe, but they tried to take you, too," Joe reminded her.
"But they didn't know that Liz was coming, at first," Frank pointed out. "The kidnapping was staged, and when they found out Liz was there – then that was luck on their side."
"That reminds me of the email virus," Joe spoke up. "Liz told me it could only have been sent from a school computer."
"Actually, that was what I wanted to tell you the other night before someone tried to kidnap me the first time," Liz explained. "I've checked the log files in my computer at school – someone had been looking through Frank's profile. And I'm sure it wasn't me, or George."
"Had Bruce been using your computer?" Frank asked him.
Liz bit her lower lip. "Yeah, once because he had to scan a picture for his class project. The scanner in the computer lab wasn't working. I did left him alone in the office for a few minutes."
"And he took the opportunity to check my profile at that time," Frank concluded thoughtfully.
***
Duncan Blackwell was in his office when the Hardys and Liz arrived there. The twenty-one-year-old young man was sitting behind his computer, typing something furiously. It seemed he was the only one left in the office.
"Hey, Duncan! Working overtime?" Joe called out to him, walking toward Duncan's cubicle. His friend was a programmer in Datatronics.
"Oh, hi, Joe. I was about to think you weren't coming," Duncan replied with a grin. He stood up, towering the three of them. His gray eyes looked at the rest of the visitors.
"This is Elizabeth Bishop," Joe introduced him to Liz.
"The one in the newspaper?" Duncan raised a dark eyebrow questioningly.
"She's innocent," Joe assured him.
"Aha, I used to be in the same boat as you," Duncan told her, shaking her hand. "Thanks to the Hardys, they cleared my name."
"I hope it turns out well for me, too," Liz replied, looking a little awed by Duncan. "I've heard about you, too – just didn't expect you to be this…young."
"Don't worry, I've been told that many times," he replied good-naturedly.
"You look well," Joe commented to Duncan, slapping him by his broad shoulders. He hadn't seen his friend for a while. Duncan's thick black hair had grown longer, and had to be tied back. Joe still couldn't get used to seeing him in formal working suit. His friend would look more at home in a pair of jeans.
He glanced at his wristwatch. "Thanks. I hope Lyn doesn't wait for me at home for dinner," Duncan replied, referring to his wife. "I wished we have a dog so I can slip food to under the table."
"Man, it couldn't be that bad," Joe said with a grin.
"If you think it's not bad eating 'charcoal', then you're insane. She wouldn't even let me cook."
"Poor Duncan. I guess Lyn is the big boss in the house, huh?" Joe shook his head, looking amused.
Duncan just gave him a mock warning glare. Then, he turned to Frank and grinned. "So, wie geht's?"
"Ganz gut," Frank replied.
Joe groaned. "You two should make an appointment one day to practice your German."
"Was ist passiert?" Duncan pointed to Frank's bandaged wrists and the wounds on his face.
"It's a long story," Frank replied. "Anyway, we need a favor from you," he told Duncan and quickly explained their problem.
"Sure, no problem," Duncan told them.
"Thanks," Liz replied gratefully. "We might need a spectrum analyzer that has a Bluetooth transceiver, and…" she began naming a few software, and other tools she needed.
Duncan began pulling out an analyzer from a nearby shelf and placed it on his desk. To Joe, it looked like a heart monitor, which he usually saw in hospitals.
"I've already got the software installed in my computer," Duncan told them. "Make yourself at home."
"Thanks," Frank replied and sat behind Duncan's desk. He pulled out the board from his jacket. Liz began setting up the connection between the board, the computer, and the analyzer with an expert ease.
"Okay, it's ready," Liz said a few minutes later.
"I just have one question," Frank said. "Since I've already downloaded my own project program into the memory, wouldn't it erased your original program?" he asked her.
"It doesn't matter where you've downloaded it, like I've told you earlier, there are certain part of the chip that are not included in the specs. So, my program's safe, and you couldn't erase it anyway, unless you burned it out physically."
"What's the analyzer for?" Joe asked curiously.
"To check if there's any radio signal coming from the chip," Liz explained.
"If it doesn't?"
"Then either it's the wrong chip, or the chip is faulty."
She began typing something on the keyboard. Frank noticed she was executing some programs. Her fingers were flying over the keyboard, too fast for Frank to catch on. He could only see some hexadecimal numbers scrolling up on the screen. He didn't think he'd done this before.
"You're debugging the program," Duncan said, who obviously had no problem noting what she was doing.
"You didn't do any backups when you did the program last time?" Frank asked her.
"I did, but everything is kept by my ex-boss," she told him. "Except for this chip. It's the only prototype from the project."
"But if he had enough information from the project, he could make another chip by himself," Joe remarked thoughtfully.
"Actually, I had the backup program encrypted, and protected with a password," Liz said sheepishly. "I'm the only one who knows about it."
"I'll bet Garcia's furious about that," Frank commented.
Liz began pushing some buttons, and turning some knobs to tune right frequency on the analyzer.
Joe could see a sinuous neon-green line against the black background on the analyzer.
"Now, I'm trying to send a word to the board," Liz explained as she typed 'HELLO' from the keyboard. "I'm doing a feedback loop – so whatever I just sent, would be looped back into this computer."
A few seconds later, the green lines on the analyzer began moving erratically. Duncan adjusted the knob to get the right focus on the signal. Then the computer screen began displaying a series of alphabets and numbers.
"Seems to be working. The analyzer is receiving the data from the board - wirelessly," Duncan told them a while later. "And returns it back to the PC."
"You can tell from looking at that?" Joe asked in amazement, glancing at the gibberish words on the computer screen.
"It's in an encrypted form," Liz explained. "If I decrypt it, I would get back the original word that I've sent." She continued typing again, and the screen flashed the word 'HELLO'.
"Yep, it's working," she said in relief.
"You'll be surprised how much information we can capture using this analyzer – cell phone signals, radio, you name it," Duncan explained to Joe.
"So, now we know it's working," Frank said, "I think I'd better remove the chip from my project board. Do you have a soldering equipment, Duncan?"
"Yeah, it's a good thing I just used it. You don't have to wait long to get it warmed-up," he replied and pointed to another room.
"Thanks," Frank said. He disconnected his board from the terminal, and headed to the room. Then he carefully de-soldered the chip from his board. He used a pair of tweezers to pick up the chip.
A few minutes later, he returned to the others.
"So, what now?" Joe asked Frank.
"I think we give this chip to Dad. He'll know what to do. I'm not convinced about giving this to the CIA or the FBI," his brother replied. Then he turned to Duncan. "We'd better get going now. Thanks again, Duncan."
"Like I said, no problem. It's all I can do after you helped me last time."
After saying goodbye to Duncan, the three of them headed home.
"So, how's your meeting with Duncan?" Mr. Hardy asked his sons, when they found him in the kitchen, preparing to eat his dinner. Mrs. Hardy was serving a couple of side dishes on the table.
The waft of pot roast made Joe's stomach growling in anticipation. While Frank explained to his father about the chip, Joe made his way to the table and helped himself with the dinner.
"Who's your friend?" Mrs. Hardy asked Joe when she noticed Liz.
Joe quickly introduced Liz to his mother, who offered her to join them. Liz politely accepted her offer and sat down next to Joe.
"Joe, what is that smell?" his mother asked, wrinkling her nose.
"Uh…I forgot to take a bath?" Joe answered meekly, knowing he still had the scent of smoke on him.
"Really, young man," his mother shook her head. "You remind me of that fireplace in my cousin's home in Scotland." She shuddered at the thought.
"I'll clean up after this," Joe promised solemnly. He quickly washed his hands before returning to the table.
"So, I heard you're quite a wanted person," Mrs. Hardy made a conversation with Liz, as she placed a big bowl of potato salad on the table.
Liz looked uncomfortable. "Yeah, I guess you could say that…the FBI, my boss, Massalski," she replied. "Quite a bunch of characters, huh?"
"Massalski?" Mrs. Hardy prompted as if recognizing the name. She turned to her husband with raised eyebrows. "Fenton, wasn't he the one who kidnapped you years ago?"
"Kidnapped?" Joe suddenly looked interested. "You never told us, Dad."
"It's not that important, really," Mr. Hardy answered dismissively. His expression suddenly turned guarded. "I –"
The sudden shrill of the phone interrupted the conversation.
"I'll get it." Frank ran to pick up the phone.
"Hardy residence."
"Frank Hardy," a smooth voice suddenly growled, "I know you have the chip. Bring it tonight at midnight, including Ms. Bishop – Bayport Park, first bench on the right after the main entrance. No cops – just bring yourself and Ms. Bishop."
"Why should I?" Frank suddenly realized the man was Morris.
Morris gave a harsh laugh. "I'm glad you asked. You see…I've got your friends as the bargain. Two of them actually."
Two? He suddenly grew worried. "You're lying."
"I'll convince you," Morris replied. Frank could almost see the smug look on his face.
"Frank?" It was Phil on the line.
"Phil, are you all right? What happened?" he asked anxiously.
"I'm fine. I –"
"Enough?" Morris was back at the end of the line.
"What about the other one?"
"You mean the pretty blond?" Morris sneered.
"F-Frank?" A girl's voice suddenly came over. She sounded as if she tried to conceal her nervousness.
Frank grew cold when he heard the familiar voice. Fear almost made his brain numb. "Callie," he breathed. "Are you all right? Where are you?"
"Satisfied?" Morris's voice came over before Callie could answer.
"She's not involved in this. Both of them aren't," Frank said through clenched teeth. His grip around the receiver tightened.
"Too late, she was dropping off some books at the Cohen's house when we took the boy. Let's just say, she was at the wrong place at the wrong time. You bring the chip and Ms. Bishop tonight, and we'll let them go."
"If you hurt them, I'd swear I'll –"
"I'm not playing your rules, kid. Bring them tonight. Meanwhile, my men have some nice toys to play on the girl and the boy," Morris laughed and hung up the phone.
But Frank could hear Callie's terrified scream before the phone went dead.