Chapter Eleven
“Are you absolutely sure Tom wants that done?” Phillip’s hand nervously shook
the latest feature-filled iPhone he had purchased over the weekend. “And what
if I get caught?”
“Then you won’t have to worry about the raise and promotion you’ve bugged me about for the last six months,” Ray stated, before releasing a small laugh. “’Cause you’ll no longer be working here. In fact, should you do get caught and someone comes around here asking about you, the only reply they’ll get is, ‘Sorry. No one at Krypton Software has ever heard of him.’”
“Unbelievable,” Phillip shouted, banging his fist against the outer realm of his Mustang’s steering wheel. “You are one cold-hearted mother, Ray. I had a feeling that if I took this assignment I could end up getting screwed – and you’ve confirmed that I was right.”
Ray replied with total silence.
“I’m sorry. What did you say, Phillip?” he said a moment later. “I couldn’t make it out. There must have been some interference on the line. Would you mind repeating that?”
“No. It’s wasn’t anything important. Don’t worry about it,” Phillip replied through gritted teeth. “So Tom specifically ordered that we obtain a copy of the computer club’s game, even though it’s far from being completed?”
“Indirectly, yes. Mike and him held a meeting yesterday to discuss Paul Pontiac’s condition, and shortly afterwards, I got the word that this is what they want done.”
“Tom must be worried that Paul’s going to die.”
Ray took a deep breath, and then loudly exhaled.
“It certainly sounds like it. But I believe he’s more concerned about possible programming changes the other club members might start making on the game since it’s obvious Paul’s going to be gone for a while.”
“So Mike isn’t comfortable with the way Tim and Daniel might complete it?”
“Maybe. But it looks more like he doesn’t want to take a chance of something getting screwed up. After all, we’re depending on the slightly modified version we’re going to make from it in order to get us back on top of the sales charts.”
Ray suddenly paused, and the metallic clack of an aluminum beverage can being set on the top of a Formica desktop could be heard over the phone’s headset.
“As we’ve previously discussed, Tim does have limited experience working with 3-D graphics since he helped Paul develop Clash of the BattleStars. However, from the info we’ve been able to get regarding Daniel, all the graphic work he has ever messed with was only in 2-D. … And since the release of Avatar, 2-D games no longer are best sellers.”
“True. But let’s not forget that Daniel’s a fast learner. I’d make a bet he’d be able to pick up 3-D in no time.”
Ray rapped his fingertips across the top of his desk.
“Yeah. You probably right, Phillip. However, a student is only as good as their teacher. And Daniel should be learning 3-D programming from Tim, not Paul.”
Phillip paused. “Hmm. You do have a point.”
“So. In getting back to the matter at hand. How soon will you be able to get this job done?” Ray asked, grabbing a pen and a “Post-It” so he could remind himself to tell someone to quickly develop an instant delete program that could be used to erase Phillip’s records from the company’s employment files should his mission fail.
“I’ll drop by Gibsonville’s Administrative offices around two this afternoon and pretend I’m a local building inspector so I can scope out the place. And if things aren’t too complicated, I’ll slip inside about an hour after sunset.”
Ray nodded his approval, though Phillip couldn’t see it.
“OK, Phil. But remember to play it cool when you do. We definitely don’t need any suspicions aroused if you’re expecting to be successful.”
“10 - 4. No problem, Ray. Just be sure to have the paperwork for my raise and promotion all ready for signing the moment I return tomorrow.”
“Don’t worry. It will be … as long as you don’t screw up.”
And upon hearing those words, Phillip pressed the iPhone’s End button and commenced to stare out his Mustang’s windshield.
Would the plan I devised weeks ago for this contingency work? And if it doesn’t, what going to happen to me then? I could be looking at some serious jail time.
*****
Sunset arrived quickly as Phillip mentally spent hour after hour fine-tuning his scheme for entering Gibsonville School and making a copy of the computer club’s game. Sure, getting inside the antique, brick-and-mortar building wouldn’t be hard. After all, construction back in the eighteen hundreds wasn’t nearly as impregnable as it is today. But making a copy of the kid’s game in such a way where not even an expert would be able to detect it? – That would be another story.
To enter inside the school, Phillip decided by taking East Joyner Street, then turning right on Church Street – not only would he be able to determine if anyone was parked in the Faculty parking lot, he would also be able to catch any visible lights coming from either the front or east side of the building. And if there weren’t any, he could then pull into the school’s back entrance and scan the student’s lot before parking on the other side of the gym, in the designated Bus Parking area. This location would be pretty much hidden from anyone passing by since it was more-or-less a large gravel patch located between the gym and the school itself.
Gibsonville should be empty now, Phillip thought, revving the Mustang’s engine after spending the past forty-five minutes stuffing himself at the Golden Corral off Garden Loop Road in Burlington. He never could resist their “All you can Eat” Seafood night.
The headlights on his Boss® automatically flickered on the second their sensors determined it was dark, and twenty minutes later, he was cruising past the front of the school.
“Well. It seems I lucked up tonight,” Phillip muttered as he slowly coasted into the Bus Parking area and shut off his engine. “All lights are off. There are no cars in either parking lot. Nor is there a single person in sight.”
A broad smile automatically formed as he opened the driver’s side door. He then turned and gazed at the oak trees lining Church Street, before diverting his attention toward the gym and eventually the colonial-style school building now facing him.
This is going to be child’s play.
However, the moment he reached the last metallic step leading to the school’s back entrance, an unexpected creak resounded.
“Whoa. What was that?” Phillip blurted, before stopping to survey his surroundings.
He paused to watch the back of the surrounding houses on Church Street. Heaven knows the last thing he would need is for a concerned citizen to be calling 9-1-1.
“Hopefully, no one else heard it.”
He then laid low in order to see if any porch lights were going to flick on.
A few minutes later after not seeing anything, he took out the master key he had swiped during his earlier visit and unlocked the school’s back door.
“Okay. That was easy enough,” Phillip declared as the lock clacked open. He felt quite pleased when the door, soon thereafter, shut behind him.
Thus, grabbing his flashlight, he proceeded down the hallway toward the stairwell, which would take him to the Office Skills classroom.
Directly across from the magnificent old school building with its tall, white columns standing proud amongst the surrounding giant oak trees, and a red-brick sign declaring this residence was “Home of the Yellow Jackets,” stood a prominent religious center known as the Gibsonville United Methodist Church. Its bell tower struck the hour the moment Phillip opened the door to the Office Skills classroom.
“So where would a bunch of kids from the computer club store a copy of their program?” Phillip asked himself as he gazed over the thirty-some desktops residing inside. “They wouldn’t be so foolish as to keep their game on a hard drive, or would they?”
Phillip took a seat in front of a nearby monitor and flipped a nearby desktop’s red switch. A Windows logo soon appeared.
“This is all too simple,” he said with a grin while selecting the keystrokes needed to bypass the operating system’s Start-up password.
Less than five seconds later, Phillip was examining the hard drive’s directory.
“So you must be calling it Plutonium’s Revenge.” Phillip chuckled as he opened the game’s folder and displayed the Properties of the game’s EXE file. “Nice title. A good eye-catcher.” In selecting each Properties tab, he continued to search for every detail possible. “Owned by the Gibsonville Computer Club. … Saved in read-only mode. I see that only Paul, Tim, and Daniel are allowed full access.”
The software gods must be with me tonight, Phillip thought, glancing toward the ceiling. After all, what are the odds of Tim Hegler’s PC being the first one I sit at – One out of thirty?
Hearing a sudden noise outside and noticing a Guilford County Sheriff’s vehicle in view of the classroom’s back window, Phillip involuntarily gulped.
“Uh, oh. This isn’t good. Was there a motion detector I somehow missed? … If there was, I certainly didn’t see it.”
Phillip frowned before taking a small flash drive out of his pocket and shoving it into one of the computer’s USB slots. He then activated the third-party software he had preinstalled. The program would prevent the time and date stamps within the desktop’s primary FAT table from being changed the moment the files in the Plutonium’s Revenge directory were successfully copied.
*****
“So how soon will you be stopping by my office?” Ray asked over the phone as Phillip turned his Mustang into the Krypton Software’s employee parking lot. “Mike wants the game in our developer’s hand - ASAP.”
“That all depends,” Phillip replied. “How soon will I be getting my raise and promotion?”
“In a couple of minutes – if you didn’t screw anything up.”
Phillip grinned, and a couple of minutes later he entered Ray’s doorway and handed him the flash drive.
There was no doubt. From here on out, life was going to be good to him, and he was finally going to get what he really deserved. Phillip looked happier than a child who had raided a candy store.
Until ten seconds later …