Dismal Angel 2010 - Episode 12
Chapter 3: How Stupid
Kitty sat down at the computer in the war room, "guys guys guys," she muttered under her breath, "what is it with me and guys?!" she demanded to herself, although letting it be semi-directed at Ororo Munro who was updating some of the team records to include new skills or experience levels.
"Is something wrong?" Ororo asked distractedly, she was sifting through a notepad she'd scribbled some comments on.
"No…" Kitty sighed, "well…yes…well, no, well…yes AND no."
"You have lost me," Ororo responded, she turned slightly to stare at Kitty.
Kitty opened the CDrom tray and slipped the new software in, she closed it and went through the run command to start the installation, "Guys. My problem is guys. Guys. Stupid guys."
Ororo was still quite in the dark, "I don't understand," she raised a quizzical eyebrow and slightly smiled in confusion.
"I would LOVE to be able to just focus completely a hundred percent on the task at hand here," Kitty was typing with some force out of anger, "God knows, I know Remy could be going through so much pain or torture right now – and that every minute I waste I'm compromising his safety," Kitty frowned, "and I want to be able to just concentrate on trying to find him as soon as possible, and I have one guy I know asking me out and telling me he has a crush on me and an ex-boyfriend trying to get back together with me…and meanwhile…I'm thinking about this other guy I kind of like who just doesn't seem to know I exist…" Kitty whined, "I shouldn't have the time to think about it…and yet, it's all I can think about today."
The installation of the software began, and Kitty watched its' progress slowly mounting as it was installing.
"I thought Kurt and yourself had agreed to never reconcile?" Ororo asked, she was typing in the records section of the database, her attention still on Kitty's dilemma.
"I thought so too," Kitty said, "and then…I don't know, we were in the elevator and he hugged me and then, he was kissing me, and for one moment it felt good, and familiar, but then I reminded myself it was wrong…and…now he's upset because I told him it's over for good."
Ororo nodded, understanding.
"I used to think Rogue had a complicated love life," Kitty gave a half laugh, "who'd have ever thought I'd have those problems?"
"Do you love Kurt?" Ororo asked, but then her expression changed, "Oh, I am sorry, of course…it is none of my business," she flushed, and she looked away slightly embarrassed.
"It's okay," Kitty assured, she checked the progress of her installation and then turned back to Ororo, "I…I do love him, he's been one of my best friends since I became one of the X-Men, but…I don't know...I'm not like Jean, I can't love a team mate and keep a professional distance, and not get frantic when something goes wrong," Kitty explained, "It's bad enough worrying about him when we're just friends, but…if I was letting myself love him as I used to…I don't know, I think if something happened to him, I'd just die, 'Ro."
Ororo smiled slightly, "I understand, Kitty. But not loving Kurt isn't going to keep him any safer. And you might be missing out on so much…"
"I know," Kitty nodded, "I guess I've also been keeping my options open…"
"For the man you really do care for," Ororo nodded, listening.
"But…I don't think he's interested, and he's a dumb ox who can't even take a hint," Kitty said stubbornly, "maybe it's just because he's incredibly good looking, or maybe its just because I can't have him that I want him, but I just…can't get over this guy…oh, crap, okay, installation is done."
"What are you installing?" Ororo asked.
"Some kind of virus software I got from a friend – he said it will get me into the GMCF server," Kitty loaded up her trace tracker, and her IP mapping system, "okay…" she sucked in a breath, "cross your fingers and hope this works…" she began to set up a connection, clicking on several different servers to bounce her connection along.
"What are you doing…what are all these…little points," Ororo gestured to the screen, watching with fascination.
"Servers of various companies who do online business…I'm bouncing the connection off of them."
"You have lost me," Ororo pulled her chair nearer to watch.
Kitty turned to Ororo, "If I directly connect to the server I want to get to, I'd be traced almost immediately. I connect using several different servers that re-route me so that I can't be detected as easily – it gives me more time to search for what I'm looking for – just as long as I clear the logs of my activity on the server before I disconnect from the server, I can't be traced – that and clearing the logs off a couple of the other servers I used."
"Right," Ororo gave a vague nod although it seemed as if she didn't really know what Kitty was talking about at all. Kitty didn't mind, it wasn't exactly easy to understand first time around.
"Right," Kitty pushed the connect button, "Lets see what happens."
Kitty watched as the connection established itself, and proceeded to the treble login screen, she loaded up her password breaker and elliption curve decipher software, and easily got through them both. "Okay," she glanced at the trace tracker, it had begun to pick up a trace leaving her with 1200 seconds to get into the server and find out what she needed to find out.
"Is it working?"
"I'll find out now," Kitty loaded up the program Pentothal v1.0. A simple black box on the screen appeared, and requested an instruction to be typed in. Kitty frowned, "shit…what did Ryan say I had to type in?" She tried to think, it was blank in her mind, "god how stupid am I?! I should have written it down…" she closed her eyes tightly and tried to hear it in her head. She then snapped her eyes open, "cd user," she typed in, she hit return and waited.
'NO SUCH COMMAND', the black screen told her via some block letters in gray.
Kitty tried again, typing several times with no luck. The same message kept appearing, reminding her that she was definitely doing something wrong.
"Shit shit shit," Kitty swallowed, she grabbed her cellular phone and dialled Ryan's number, she watched the trace tracker, it was down to 1000 seconds already. The phone rang, and rang, she was losing hope of ever getting a reply, then a sleepy voice came down the line.
"H'lo."
"Ryan…it's Kitty," Kitty said quickly, she could feel sweat building up on her forehead from panic, "I forgot the command to use on that program…you said CD user, didn't you? I typed it and it's not working…" she swallowed nervously.
"Did you try again?" Ryan asked.
"Yes," Kitty groaned, "What can I do?"
"Okay, try typing cd admin," Ryan suggested.
Kitty tried, a new message came up on the black screen, "it's telling me 'Authorisation required'."
"Kitty, I didn't program the software so I don't know what else to tell you, it's like I said, you type 'cd usr', then 'authorise', and then 'console' and that gets you in…" Ryan stated clearly, "are you using lower case?"
"Yes," Kitty groaned, she glanced to the trace tracker, Ryan, I have 800 seconds left, I need to get in RIGHT now."
"Relax, that's still like 13 minutes," Ryan uttered, "I'm trying to think of what you might be doing wrong…" on the other end, it went silent as he paused for thought, "Wait…you are typing the command right, aren't you?"
"What'd you mean?" Kitty asked.
"cd usr…you aren't spelling it with an 'E' are you?" Ryan asked.
Kitty rolled her eyes, "of course I am, that's how you SPELL user."
"It's not USER," Ryan gasped, "don't you know ANYTHING? It's U.S.R."
"Fuck," Kitty muttered, "you could have TOLD me that," she growled, she typed in the command on the black screen. "Oh my god!! It worked!" Kitty squealed.
"Type 'Authorise' and then 'Console'," Ryan said, "I gotta go now, I'm watchin' 'X-Files'," he added, and with that, hung up.
Kitty tossed her phone aside, "right," she said, and typed in 'Authorise'.
'AUTHORISATION PERMITTED: PLEASE TYPE IN COMMAND' the message appeared. Kitty grinned broadly and typed 'console'. The black screen disappeared, and replaced itself with a new screen, a silver screen with several different labelled options. "Oh my god! We're in!" Kitty happily stated in a shrill tone, "okay…what's here," she read the screen quickly, the list of options available were; 'Admin', 'Security', 'ISO-1', 'ISO-2', 'Records' and 'Search'.
Ororo was watching, sharply observing, keen to find out what Kitty might uncover, she shrewdly noted on the top of the screen the full name of the mutant containment facility. She whispered, "Genoshan Mutant Containment Facility."
"Genoshan?" Kitty asked, "what is that?"
"The facility must be based on Genosha…" Ororo stated.
"I've never heard of Genosha," Kitty confessed.
"It's not a very well known place, Kitty. It's off the coast of Africa. I visited there as a child with my parents not long before they died. The island was almost completely deserted…"
Kitty chose the search option, "we have 10 minutes to find out as much as we can," she typed in Remy's name. 'LeBeau, Remy,'. The search software was running at a low speed, Kitty noticed the names of several people coming up through the listings, 'Hey…did you see that?!" Kitty gaped, "I saw Pietro's name appear there!"
"As did I," Ororo leaned in closer to view.
A very loud fast beeping alerted Kitty, and she glanced towards the trace tracker, "oh shit…" she whispered.
"What…?" Ororo asked.
Before Kitty had a chance to answer or do anything else, the screen totally went black, and only two words appeared there, in a large gray font. The words made Kitty's heart almost stop and her breath catch in her throat.
'CONNECTION TERMINATED BY SYSTEMS ADMINISTRATOR'.
Kitty could barely move, or blink, she sat, gaping, and one exasperated word made its' way out of her mouth. "FUCK."