Messing with the Hacker

Nitte nods, thinking, "OK. I was going to make up some lies, so you would think I'm super cool, and maybe even think I have super hacker skills, too. But no. It's actually purely luck."

"What luck?"

They continue to walk through the air vent that now goes through the hospital intensive care rooms. The beeping sound on those machines in those patients' room make Jack uncomfortable. They finally arrive at the administrative area. It feels a little better to be out of the medical zone.

Jack shoots out a single elastic thread, and he lowers himself into an office. Nitte also climbs down the wall.

"Let's talk here. I feel the echoes in the vent might get us in trouble," Jack says.

Nitte nods again, "Aww, you are such a careful person. I like it."

Jack waves one hairy leg, "OK. So what luck has brought you to the hacker's girlfriend?"

"So... I was just taking a break as a squirrel in a park, minding my business. But I overheard a very pretty girl talking on the phone at one corner of the park.  It caught my attention because she looked a bit secretive. So I climbed up the tree near her, and I heard her saying things such as "hack into..." and "oil prices" and "long line to fuel up," stuff like that.    I then followed her to her place.  I looked from outside the window and found a way inside.  She was again talking on the phone.  This time, it seemed to be with a different guy.  She put him on speaker phone and they sounded like they were boyfriend and girlfriend.  And that guy was very proud, saying how he can attack other facilities in Europe for the next highest bidder, creating more chaos."

"Shit. That does sound like that hacker.  Son of a b***."

"By the way, her name is Amelia."    Nitte waves her tiny mouse arms.

"You are such a stalker.  Good job!"  Jack also waves one of his hairy legs.

"Yeah!  What do you do without me!"

"But the hacker is obviously not here in this hospital."

"Well, I said I found the girlfriend, I didn't say for sure the hacker is here. But, earlier, I saw this girlfriend stopping by the hospital.  From her interaction with the people here, I thought she either works here or someone she knows works here.  We can try to check."

"Um, Nitte, We don't know what he looks like."

"I mean.... we can mess up the hospital computer system, and see if either the girlfriend or the hacker would come rushing over to help save the hospital computer system." Nitte wiggles her tail.

Jack doesn't think it will work, but he doesn't have a choice.  He can at least give it a try.  If his girlfriend comes to this hospital a lot, the hacker will naturally want to help her girlfriend's hospital computer system.  At least, that is what Jack hopes.

Jack then crawls around the office. Jack jumps on one desktop computer keyboard, pressing the space key. He sees a user name on the log in page, waiting for him to type in a set of password.

"Jonathan Cohen? Who is this?" Nitte hops over, staring at the screen.

"I don't know.  Just trying to see if we can log in, so I can try to mess something up.  Too bad it's locked. I don't know the password."

"Hmm. Well.  Let's walk over the the receptionist desk to see if we could mess something up."

So they climb back to the vent, finds the reception area, and slowly climb down. Jack see a receptionist just standing up, walking to the back counter to refill a mug of coffee. He immediately jumps over to the keyboard, hitting the "delete" and "backspace" keys as fast as he can. He sees many contacts and numbers being deleted.

"Quick! The receptionist is coming back!" Nitte warns Jack.

Jack feels sweaty. Even though he is not sure if a spider can sweat. He quickly hits the key "enter," hoping it saves whatever he just did.

Jack quickly jumps down from the desk and onto the floor. The receptionist comes walking back.  As the receptionist takes one last step to reach her chair,  she is almost stepping on Jack.

"EEEEK!"

Nitte lets out one small squeal. That sound is enough for the receptionist to look down and sees a spider and a mouse.

"AHHHHHHHH!" The receptionist screams.

Both Jack and Nitte hurry out of the reception area and disappears into the vent.

After they leave the hospital, they are both breathing hard. Not just because they were running, but they were spotted.

"Looks like that was a failed attempt.  I feel stupid now." Jack sighs, and  waves his leg, "OK.  Can you tell me how to change myself back?"

"You don't have to change yourself back yet. We need to travel back first. If you are in human form, it's going to take a long while. Hop on my back, let's hurry back."

After they return to the city. Jack jumps away from Nitte.

Nitte shrugs and changes back to her human form.

"Hey. Teach me!" Jack yells.

"What's that?" Nitte puts a hand by her ear, pretending she can't hear Jack. "What did you say?"

"I said, teach me how to change myself back!"

"If I teach you, can you promise me one thing?"

"Yeah, sure. I'm really feeling sick for having so many eyes. And I was riding on you, I feel like I have motion sickness now."

"Oooh. What did you say?" Nitte bends her body lower.

"I said, I have motion sickness now. Come on, you can hear me. Don't make me repeat. I have a headache now." Jack is impatient now.

"I like the part you said you were riding me. Maybe next time when you learn how to become a wolf, I can ride you."

"OK. My Gosh, Nitte. Stop playing around."

"All you need to do is concentrate on being you. Close your eyes. Calm down. Think about yourself and your favorite memory. Try a few times. You'll be able to turn yourself back into Jack again."

Jack follows Nitte's suggestion. He tries four times, and finally on the fifth time, he feels his limbs floating and expanding.

Jack opens his eyes. He is back to being himself again.

"Oh thank god. Being a spider is not that fun."

Nitte gives a round of quick clapping, "Can we go eat?"

"Again? Why are you always hungry?"

"Aww, you remember something about me. Do you want to learn more about me?" Nitte laughs.

Jack thinks to himself, he really just wants to know what she has done that Keith wants to kill her eventually.