>LOL FROM WHERE YOU ARE?”<
>SURE<
>LET ME THINK ON IT BEFORE U TRY ANYTHING<
>DON’T WAIT 2 LONG. MINER1 HAS THE CASH NOW<
RiotousOne hated making quick decisions. He liked to think things through before he accepted a job. It wasn’t the money that really mattered. It was the challenge. Something he had never done before. The more he thought about it the more enthralled he became with the idea.
Within minutes he started working on a program. He would need more information from Miner1 but if he was really serious he would get what was needed. Twenty-five thousand wasn’t much but he decided to do the job.
He sat down and typed out a text and instructions with what he would need.
“Hey Sally.”
“Oh, you scared the bejeepers out of me Art.”
“Sorry. I just thought I would drop in and see this fancy machine you've got here.”
“Sure, no problem. It really is amazing.”
“So what does this thing really do,” he said looking around at all the monitors, gauges and dials.
“Here. These are the actual controls. The two joy sticks control forward motion and speed. They also control direction. See that monitor up there,” she said pointing to the one in the center of a cluster of other monitors, “That red line is the GPS projected route to get the maximum amount of coal.”
“It does it automatically?”
“For the most part. Sometimes it gets a little off and the operator has to bring it back using this joy stick here,” she told him placing her hand on the left lever.
“And no one else is in the mine?” Art asked.
“No. There are four guys outside that line up the conveyor sections and add them on when the light tells them to.”
“Geez. Who makes this stuff? I mean it’s pretty darned advanced.”
“A really cool company called Dynamic Engineering. We went there for training.”
“They wrote the software program as well?”
“Oh heavens no. They subcontracted that to TechnoSoft. They do a lot of work for the government we were told.”
“Darned impressive. I still can’t believe it needs no humans.”
“Hey, I’m a human,” she kidded.
“Yes you are, and a darn fine one to boot.”
“You want to sit here and control it. I’ll show you how everything works.”
“No thanks. Technology and I don’t get along very well. I can’t even get the clock on the DVD player set.”
“Who can?” she said and laughed.
>FOO? HAVE INITIAL INFORMATION FOR PROJECT<
>GA READY<
>FYI DID NOT VERIFY DATA<
>K<
RiotousOne watched as the screen fill with the information he would need. The most disturbing part was that the programming came from TechnoSoft. He had managed to crack their computer safeguards only once. They had built in several traps and he would have to be extremely careful. The final message came across his screen.
>MTFBWY<
The force had better be with me, RiotousOne said under his breath. His next task would be to find a way into TechnoSoft without leaving any fingerprints. It would take him quite a while to devise a way to accomplish this feat.
CHAPTER NINE
“You have the money?”
“Right here,” Art said holding up a briefcase.
“Then all I need is to know when you want this to take place. Once you give the final word, there will be no going back,” the man told Art.
“We have talked it over, we're ready.”
“Here is a number. Call it when you want the project to proceed. The phone will ring three times followed by a beep. You only need to say one word. GO. After that everything will be set in motion. It will take about a half hour before control is gained,” the mule said.
Art never suspected that the man he was talking to was just a cutoff. He believed the man was the actual hacker. The mule would then in turn pass the briefcase, less one thousand dollars to the second mule. He would take his cut and repeat two more times until it got to a drop-off point. No one would ever actually see RiotousOne. The mule slid a disposable cell phone across the table.
“After you call, take the battery out and throw it someplace no one will find it easily. Same for the phone. Get rid of it as quickly as you can.”
“Got it. Do I call now?”
“You can call any time after I leave. When is up to you,” the man said, picking up the briefcase.
“Then we are done?”
“Absolutely,” he said and headed out the door with the briefcase.
Art sat there with the phone in his hand. It felt hot to the touch. Man, once he dialed the number there was no way to stop what was about to happen. He closed his eyes for a few seconds and then opened the phone and dialed the number. He heard his own voice say, GO.”
“It’s all yours Sally. All readings are normal," Tommy said, sliding out of the seat so she could check all of the readings for herself.
When she was satisfied she said, “You’re relieved. I've got it.”
“Have a good one. I gotta run. Bowling tonight.”
“That’s right. You guys are in a big tournament.”
“And we are going to win.”
“I think I heard that last year,” Sally teased.
“I got game this year. They don’t stand a chance,” Tommy replied heading out the door to his car.
She heard him whistling as the door slowly closed.
Sally checked the gauges one more time before getting out her iPad and hitting the browser icon. She clicked on the Amazon button to check the latest e-Book offerings. Suddenly red lights started flashing across the board and alarms went off. Startled she dropped the iPad and glanced at the board. Most of the readings were off the scale. The BARD was no longer following the GPS route.
She grabbed the control sticks and began inputting data to stop the machine and to try to get it back on the right path. Nothing was working. No matter what she did the BARD continued to eat into the side of the cavern but a good ten degrees off course and increasing.
She opened the emergency stop cover and hit the button. She watched as nothing happened. It was the fail safe device to shut down all operations but the BARD wasn’t responding. She stood there with her mouth open watching as the giant machine chewed into the side of the cavern. Coal was no longer coming out but chunks of rock and mud.
She was frozen in place when Mac rushed in and looked up at the monitors.
“What the hell?”
“I…I don’t know. It won’t stop,” she said, stymied.
“Did you use the emergency shut down?” he said reaching for the button.
He could see the cover was opened but he slammed his hand down on it several times trying to get the BARD to stop. Nothing happened.
“What the hell is going on?” he shouted at the monitors.
Just as suddenly he ran back out of the building and toward the cavern entrance. The four conveyor workers were just standing there looking into the huge hole.
“What happened? The damn thing just took off. We didn’t even have a chance to connect the last conveyor belt,” one of the men said, thinking they had screwed up somehow.
“Don’t worry about it. We have some sort of malfunction. Grab your hard hats,” he said looking at them sternly.
They knew they should have them on at all times but when no one was around they took shortcuts.
“Follow me. We are going to see if we can stop it. There is a master kill switch on the end of the machine. Then we will see what we need to do next.”
“You want all of us,” one of the guys said, kind of edging back.