World's End Explorers

Chapter 2

Upon reaching the base, Richard saw a bicycle that wasn't there before. It was in front of the network communications building. He pulled out his gun and ran towards the building while asking Alice to stay outside. "There he goes again," she thought.

Richard entered the building and soon realized there was someone inside. He could see that the computers in one of the rooms were being used.

He carefully approached the room, looked inside and saw someone sitting on a chair typing on one of the keyboards. He couldn't see who the person was, since the room was dark, with the only light sources being the computer's monitor screen.

Richard rushed inside the room. "Don't move!"

The person on the desk stopped typing.

"Okay, now get up, put your hands above your head and tell me who you are and what you are doing here!"

He got his answer rather quickly. "My name is Michael and I'm just trying to contact the military by using this network."

Richard got confused since the tone of the voice he was hearing wasn't exactly what he was expecting.

"Alright, turn around... Slowly."

As the person sitting on the chair turned around, Richard started to notice that he was pointing a gun to...

"A kid? Are you a fuckin' kid?"

Indeed, with curly hair, a pair of glasses and a small body, the person sitting in that room was a nerdy looking teenage boy.

"Yeah. Why?"

Richard didn't answered.

"Can you put that thing away? You may be wearing military clothing, but you're not Jean-Clade Van Damme," asked the buy.

"Dude, you're doing this again?" said Alice while approaching the two. 

"Okay, okay. I know I'm in the wrong here. It's just that I'm a bit freaked out by everything that has been happening. I am sorry."

"No problem," said Michael. "Now, do you have any idea of what's going on here? You're with the military, right? You should know something."

"I'm just a lieutenant. Even if the military knew something, there's no way I would have access to that kind of information".

"I also don't know anything but... How about you? Do you know something?" Asked Alice.

"C'mon, there's no way this lad knows anything about what's happening here," said Richard.

"Actually, that's not true, I think I might have an idea."

"Really?" shouted Richard and Alice in unison.

"Yeah, I mean, I did hack this base's computer network in less than 10 minutes, so you shouldn't be surprised that I know something about the end of the world, right?"

"You did what?" Richard said in disbelief.

"I hacked this network."

Richard looked at the computer screen. He wasn't a computer expert, but even he could tell that Micheal had, indeed, hacked the internal computer network of that military base.

"I can't believe it! This lad really hacked into our bloody network!"

Alice came close the boy and looking directly at his eyes said: "Kid, who the hell are you?"

Michael's answer was surprisingly simple. "I'm Michael, nice to meet you. By the way, you're too close, lady."

Richard couldn't contain his laugh. "Alice, you're not gonna be able to scare this kid. He's a fuckin' hacker, and a good one."