Outpost 5

Chapter 4

It was 10PM and everyone was utterly exhausted. Chanyeol had almost fallen asleep at the dinner table, Baekhyun was so tired he completely forgot about his glitter bombs, and Jongdae was strangely silent. Jay was in the communications room with her headphones on, asleep at her station, lulled off by the static, Kris had headed down to take a shower, and Cass was nodding off while reading a book and had read the same page for the tenth time. Junmyeon, however, was very much awake. He sat in his office twirling the USB drive with furrowed brows. Something about it was bothering him. He clenched it in his hand suddenly and pressed a button to lock his office door. He plugged it into his computer, the little red light illuminating indicating it was connected, and immediately it brought up a list of files, images and videos. Curiously he took a sip of his coffee and clicked on one. The thing scrambled his entire computer for a second before opening to gibberish.
"Damn." he swore.
After several more failed attempts, he sighed and sat back in his chair in frustration. What was on this drive that they didn't want him seeing? And if it was classified, why didn't it just ask for authorization codes like normal instead of bugging out his computer before turning to a garbled word document of code? He drummed his fingers thoughtfully on the desk before snatching the USB out of his computer without bothering to safely eject it and headed off down the hall.
He stood at the doorway to the communications room, really not wanting to shake Jay awake, and cleared his throat loudly. She jolted awake, pushed the headphones down around her neck and stood up, stammering out apologies.
"No, it's fine, I actually didn't expect you to be up."
"I wasn't...." Jay admitted.
"I was wondering, can you decrypt something for me?" he started, passing her the USB drive and pulling up a chair next to her.
"Uhh...oh this thing?" Jay asked, recognizing the USB drive she had been given back at the base that morning. "it won't accept your authorization codes?"
"It's not even giving me that option." Junmyeon shook his head and proceeded to describe its odd behavior when it was plugged into his computer. "it just comes up with garbled junk no matter what file I click on, even the images."
"Huh. Maybe you should ask Lt. Jongdae?" Jay suggested. "Not that I'm trying to get rid of you, it's just if it's a technical issue I'm probably not going to be of much use..."
"I— "Junmyeon stopped. How was he going to explain that he suspected it was purposely made like this, and that the garbled mess was a code without sounding like a paranoid conspiracy theorist? "I think it's purposely like that." he ended lamely.
"Wait, you think that the files are purposely written in code so that no one could read them unless they knew the code?" Jay repeated slowly, catching his meaning. "But, that brings me back to my question of why not just put in authorization codes...I should get Kris and ask her if that's a new security measure..." Jay dialed her friends number on her phone.
"Hey, do you know if the military has updated its security procedures? Like purposely corrupting codes? And if so is there like a decryption key that I just don't know about? No? No, idiot that's—yeah...oh...wait what?....no....no...look just...come up here okay?...well then get out of your pajamas!...yeesh....yeah see you in few." Jay hung up. "She'll be up in a few. In the meantime, let's try booting this troublemaker up."
She pointed to a free USB port in the side of the main computer system that Junmyeon plugged it into, the little red light blinking steadily.
"Okay. Huh. It just opens the list of files and stuff without even asking for a passkey? That's funny..."
Just then the phone next to her on the desk rang. It was one of the phones that were used to communicate around the outpost
"Yeah?" Junmyeon answered.
"Commander, not to sound like a suspicious asshole or anything but who the hell are you sending a homing signal to at 11PM?" Sehun 's gravelly voice sounded from the other end.
"Homing signal? I'm not doing anything! Your system must be wacked." Junmyeon replied with a strange look.
Kris leaned over Jay and squeezed her shoulders.
"Boo!" she whispered, seeing Junmyeon on the phone, "Why you be dragging me out of bed at this hour?"
"Look at this." Jay pointed to her. "Is this normal for encrypted documents?" She tried to open it, only to be met with the exact same issue as Junmyeon had had earlier.
"That's weird. No, policy is still the same as far as I know and if it was changed, my department is usually the first to know?" Kris leaned closer to inspect the screen. "It's like its rewriting its own code or something, that's why it glitches when you open it I think..."
"Well my wacky system says you're sending out a homing signal. Ask Burr if you don't believe me. I'm sure she's picking it up." Sehun retorted, grumpy at being woken up from sleep.
"Burr, are you picking up a homing signal emitting from that device?" Junmyeon turned to Jay who was already scribbling a series of numbers and letters furiously on a piece of paper.
"Homing signal? What? No, I— "a sudden blinking red light caught her attention and she stopped. She slammed the headphones over her head. "There! Yes! 89Ghtz...that's an odd frequency..." she furrowed her brow.
"Why would the device have a homing signal...?"
"Pull it out now!" Kris shouted suddenly, reaching over and ripping the USB out of its port.
"What?" the others asked in unison.
The response was that the entire system shut off completely, leaving the three in the dark room with nothing but the flashlight from Jay's phone.
"SHIT!"
"It was planting a virus in our systems!" Junmyeon slammed his fist on the table.
"Why are our backup generators not coming online?" Kris asked.
Junmyeon wasted no time in dialing the personal number of Jongdae "Because the idiot is probably in bed!" he tapped his foot impatiently waiting for him to pick up.
"Guys what did you do? Why are we offline?" Cass ran in, narrowly missing the corner or the door since it was so dark.
"Is there any way you can get us a visual outside?" Junmyeon demanded, hurriedly.
"With the system down? Well...I could try getting into the outside cameras from my phone at least, but I can't promise anything good until the backup comes on." Cass replied apologetically.
"Well do it. Get my anything. I want to see exactly who that homing beacon was calling." Junmyeon ordered. "Jongdae isn't answering what the hell?"
Jay reached down into her boot for her handgun.
"Can you set a secure frequency we can all communicate on?" Junmyeon questioned.
"Yes." she answered immediately, hauling out her walkie talkie from her back pocket. "I'm remotely setting everyone's thing to 34Mhtz. It's too low to be picked up by most interference, so no danger of us being bugged, but the radius is greatly diminished, so anyone in the far most corners of either the east of west wing will have trouble communicating."
"Excellent. Thank you." Junmyeon picked up his own and made an announcement. "Everyone? Code red." he switched off his device, hoping and praying everyone would pull through. First of all, he hoped everyone was awake, second that they remembered what to do in case of emergency and third that if they did remember they would keep calm and do it. And for all that was holy and his own sanity he hoped Baekhyun wouldn't scream.
"Manson, take care of that security system. Do the best you can until the backup generator is online. I want eyes everywhere. Sgt. Burr, find Sehun and go aid Lt. Jongdae get this place up and running again. Lt. Keene, with me. I want options, and I want to know who these people are and what they want."
"Yes sir!"
"All agents, be advised. The entire system is offline. That means there are no locks, no lights, no weapons and no communication. We are in the black. Be careful." he issued a final warning before pulling out his own handgun and nodding to Kris who did the same.
"Alright let's move."
The four split up, taking off into the semi-blackness. Jay crept down the hallway toward the east wing where engineering was.
"Sehun." she whispered fiercely into her communicator. "Do you copy?" Fuzzy static met her in response. She took a deep breath and tried again, "Sehun, I said— "
"Yeah, I copy." his hushed voice came on the other end. "Where are you?"
"Center tower, east stairwell, second floor." Jay replied.
"Alright. I'm coming to you. Stay put."
"Yeah well hurry up."
'Don't get scared."
"Oh yeah, I'm holding back a panic attack." Jay scoffed quietly.
About a minute later, she heard a noise on the stairwell. Hiding herself and training her gun on the descending shape she stayed perfectly still. The figure reached the second-floor landing and stopped, looking around.
"Here." Jay emerged from the shadows and Sehun jumped.
"Gah!" he whisper-yelled. "Don't do that! I—uhh, could have been a bad guy." he corrected himself quickly trying to recover his dignity.
"Your hair is like a glowing beacon, Rapunzel. I could recognize it anywhere."
"Yeah well you try keeping your cool when you see a body with what looks like cotton candy for a head coming at you out of the shadows." Sehun retorted, as the two began creeping down the stairs to the first floor.
"You're just jealous because my hair is better than yours." Jay shot back, quickly sweeping the mess into an unenthusiastic bun.
"Of your shampoo maybe. It keeps the color nicely."
"Thanks. Actually, I use— "
The two suddenly froze and pointed their guns at a shadow that skittered around a corner at the far end of the hall just as they reached the ground floor.
"That was heading for the east wing." Sehun signed to Jay.
"What the hell is taking Jongdae so long?" Jay wondered, a bit annoyed, trying to ignore the nagging feeling that something was wrong.
"Radio him again?" Sehun suggested, pulling her around the corner into a room and behind a door.
"Can you not?" Jay gave him a look. He shrugged. She stomped on his foot and he covered his mouth to cut off his squeak of surprise.
"?????" he gave her an angry look.
"!!!!!" she gave him an equally irritated look back.
"Lieutenant? Where are you? over."
Static.