“Yeah, well, I’m tired. I think I’m going to try and nap—”

“You can change your grades. I can show you how. It’s easy. Just a couple of keystrokes and you won’t be flunking anymore.”

I sat up again, not sure I’d heard her correctly.

“What?”

Rose shrugged. “If the school won’t help you, I will.”

I knew what she was talking about. There were rumors in the IT department of student hackers who liked to poke around the school’s system, sometimes for nefarious reasons.

It turned out my weirdo roommate was one of those students.

“That’s crazy,” I exclaimed, instantly dismissing her statement.

But then I paused.

And I thought about what would happen if I didn’t turn things around quickly.

The idea of going back home chilled me.

So I found myself doing something that would change my life.

I leaned forward and stared across the room at Rose, who looked up at me, her eyebrows raised.

I took a deep breath and spoke. “Show me.”

—

It was late when I finally got home. I had exactly fifteen minutes to get myself ready.

I usually had a ritual that involved a glass of wine, my favorite faded Dandy Warhols T-shirt, and a fuzzy pair of slippers.

Not the typical uniform of a prolific cracker, but it worked for me.

I didn’t have time for any of that this time.

I kicked off my shoes, grabbed a soda from the fridge, and sat down at the kitchen table. I powered up my laptop without bothering to turn on the lights.

I quickly opened my IRC client and found the chat I was looking for.

21:10 <T0x1cwrath> You’re late. Now 2110. Servers set to go down in ten.

My blood started pumping wildly. My ears started to buzz and my mouth was dry. My body went into hyperalert, ready and waiting.

I was ready.

So ready.

My fingers twitched uncontrollably and I had to take a deep breath before typing out my reply.

21:11 <Freed0m0v3rdr1v3> Botnets in place. Infected file ready.

Not for the first time I wished I knew who my mysterious partner was. Most would find it odd that I trusted someone I had no plans to ever meet. He was simply a means to an end.

Our partnership was new. I had spent years working solo. Preferring to hack as a solitary venture. I had been doing a pretty good job too.

Better than good.

I had made a name for myself in the hacker community. I had become respected.

Admired.

Feared.

My attacks were few but well executed.

My plans were faultless and without fail.

I knew I was on a lot of radars but I covered my tracks.

I was invisible.

Untraceable.

Until Toxicwrath contacted me.

It was out of the blue. At first I had been suspicious and rightly so. I worried that the person on the other end was an undercover cop trying to entrap me. I knew how the authorities operated. Trolling the deep Web looking for crackers and reaching out to make contact was a normal practice.

So I was cautious. Aloof.

Until he proved himself in the biggest way possible.

Toxicwrath had breached the firewalls of Smacktown, the largest distributor of online snuff films in the world. Everyone knew about Smacktown’s questionable reputation. There was a common belief that it orchestrated actual murders to increase its video content. It had been under investigation at one point or another for over three years. But no one could stop it. It kept doing what it was doing.

Until Toxicwrath decided to take it down.

The able hacker not only barreled straight through its security but also deleted all its movies, including its backups. Obliterating Smacktown’s business in one click of the mouse.

And every time the shady company tried to reestablish itself, my deft cracker friend took it down. He made it his mission to keep that particular scum off the Internet.

After that I trusted Toxicwrath. I might not know his face, his gender—though it was just easier to ascribe a pronoun—but I knew his morals. And they were completely in line with my own.

He became my shadow partner. Anonymous yet integral to everything.

So we had formed a hesitant partnership. I stopped being the lone gunman and I let myself rely on someone else to deliver our preferred brand of justice. Taking down only those who deserved it.

We had been planning this attack for three months.

We carefully chose our target.

It was one that was important to me.

Personal.

I had been biding my time, waiting until things were just right.

I set the groundwork. Using basic phishing scams I had been able to infect over two thousand computers so that now I could access them remotely whenever I needed to.

They would be my army tonight.

And Toxicwrath would be my eager soldier.

21:12 <T0x1cwrath> What about taking things one step further?

I frowned. My stomach flipped.

21:12 <Freed0m0v3rdr1v3> DDoS is the plan. We will make our point.

We had decided to start small; I chose Ryan Law as our target. And it wasn’t by chance. Ryan Law was a notoriously corrupt law firm that used bribery, coercion, and threats as a means to win cases.

But they were smart. They knew how to play the law and make it work for them. Dominic Ryan and his brother Jared were the lowest of the low. Choosing to represent the worst of society, they had made sure that child molesters and murderers got off with nothing more than a smile and a wave.

They had also represented the city when the families affected by the faulty roads that had caused the death of my father had decided to sue. We had wanted a little compensation to pay for funeral costs and medical bills. It was the least they could do given how many lives they had destroyed through their laziness and greed.

Dominic Ryan had ensured that we never saw a red cent.

—

“We’re dropping out of the lawsuit,” my mother announced on our way home from seeing Charlotte.

It had been six months since losing Dad and putting Charlotte in the residential facility. Mom was depressed and I was angry. The sort of anger that spurred action.

I had been the one to convince Mom to join the other families who were filing suit against the city. She had been resistant. Too overcome with the devastation that had befallen our tiny world.

But I had told her that it would give us closure. It would ensure that we were able to financially take care of Charlotte and her needs.

Mom had agreed—after a lot of arguing. And for the first time since that horrible accident I had felt something like hope.