The Days Of Fear: A TO Novel - Chapter 4

[Pythor 1,354]

PREVIOUSLY ON T.D.O.F. -- http://en.tankiforum.com/index.php?showtopic=377093 CHAPTER 3

 

C H A P T E R  4

 

 

After Michael and Aaren briefed Connor on the conversation with Underwood, the three boys rummaged through the snack sack that had been brought down into the basement. Michael stuffed a granola bar down his throat before looking up the website Underwood had mentioned. He thought for a moment, then typed in UGAHDA. A website titled www.onlineuganhda.com appeared at the top of the list. Clicking on it brought Michael to a page that asked for a password. He smiled, then typed in what Underwood had told him, UGAHDA. No one would think the password would be the same as the name of the website. So simple. Brilliant.

 

Aaren and Connor had done the same on their respective computers and now all three sat in silent anticipation. The only sound was the occasional slurp as Connor sipped a Gatorade. A ding sounded from Michael’s laptop. He leaned forward to survey the layout. Across the top of the screen in big, bold letters was written U.G.A.H.D.A. – Undercover Glitches And Hackers Detective Association. The middle of the screen contained a list of different games that the association had evidently worked for, and a list of different hackers they had caught. Tanki was one of the first games mentioned. Michael’s gaze moved over to the hackers list. The first entry read, “Parachute Man – Terminated”. The second read, “Mr. Twins – Terminated”. The list went on down the page. At the very bottom, separated from the other entries by a thick line, lay one lone name. It read “The One – At Large: Wanted”. Michael turned to his friends.

 

“Guys! This has gotta be the hacker Underwood was speaking of.” Michael pointed.

 

Aaren looked over and whistled. “The god of all hackers huh?” Connor just nodded.

 

At the top left corner of the page lay a button depicting two people talking.

 

“Wonder what this does,” Aaren said, now back at his own laptop. This time Michael and Connor leaned over toward Aaren. Clicking the button brought them to a blank white screen with no writing and no links whatsoever.

 

“Must be a mistake,” Connor muttered. Aaren was just about to go back to the main page when a loud, static sound began. It sounded like a voice was trying to talk over the noise, but Michael couldn’t be sure.

 

“Not again,” he muttered.

 

Suddenly, the static ceased and the voice became clear.

 

“Welcome to UGAHDA, we’ve been expecting you. My name is Duke Huntington, how may I help you?” The voice was deep and gruff, but friendly enough.

 

“Uh, hi,” Aaren stammered.

 

“Is Underwood there?” questioned Michael.

 

“No,” came the reply. “He’s just left to attend some business. I’m the team’s client correspondent. What do you want to know?”

 

“The team’s?” echoed Aaren. “How many of you are there?”

 

“Well, there is six of us, not including Asher.”

 

“How come you guys are so secretive?”, asked Michael. “And what exactly does the association do?”

 

“Underwood does the real work. I’m sure he’s already told you about that,” Duke replied. “The others have various jobs. We don’t exactly ‘work’ for any game in particular. Instead, we stay underground and Asher does his thing without the big gaming networks knowing.”

 

“What does Underwood do? How does he uncover the hackers?” Michael questioned.

 

“Well…” Duke paused for a moment. “That’s part of the reason we work so secretly. You see, at the beginning, when Underwood started this whole business, we did try to partner with the developers of some certain games, including Tanki. However, the devs didn’t appreciate our work, and Underwood’s fiery attitude didn’t exactly help matters. They regarded us as enemies ourselves, thus we decided to work undercover.”

 

“So Underwood is basically a hacker himself,” stated Connor.

 

Another pause.

 

“Yeah, you could call him that. He uses these skills to stop other hackers’ dirty plans. He has caught many. I assume you saw all the names on our front page. All but one…” At this point, Duke’s voice was a strange tone. “We call him ‘The One’ for lack of a better name. He’s the only hacker Asher has never conquered and by far the most dangerous hacker in the gaming universe.”

 

“So how do you plan to catch him.”

 

“That’s for Underwood to say.” Duke coughed, then resumed. “However, I do know one thing. He plans to publicize the incident you had. We have the upper hand at the moment, and more people need to know what is going on. You can bet a chocolate nickel and a bag of blowholes that it’ll be in the Tanki newspaper comimg tomorrow.”

 

 

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The boys were busy for the rest of the day. Michael and Aaren had baseball practice while Connor went accompanied his family to visit some relatives. When Michael returned home, he called Jeff and told him the new information they had gathered. Server maintenance prevented anyone from playing Tanki that night. Something about a new update bringing new maps into the game. After eating dinner, Michael watched a few innings of the Chicago Cubs game before retiring for the night. As he drifted off to sleep, he wondered how unbelievable this whole hacker business would turn out, and hoped that tomorrow, new light would be shed on the investigation...

[Flexoo 6,980]

Approved.

 

Edits:

Only slight change to the alignment of the first two paragraphs. Minor grammar fixes - removed one extra "to" in one sentence.

 

---

 

Interesting and clean piece. It's also based on a really good topic, dealing with hackers.

[kaisdf 3,320]

Oki, looks like this mult Flex got to it after I finished editing, mid way thru me writing my "article approved" post gubbins, but lemme pasta it here anyways:

 

 

Article Approved.

 

Part 4; I've been waiting for this :lol:

 

It is good, but I would say that it seemed slightly empty. Compared to previous parts, not that much happened. The last paragraph is slightly clichéd - "He went to sleep, eagerly awaiting what the next day would bring him.".

 

Negatives out of the way, it is, as usual, fantastically accurate.

 

Edits:

• Replaced the line of dashes with an [.hr] - if you don't want to use that, I would recommend underscores, to avoid the gaps between letters.
• "There are six of us", instead of "There is six of us".

 

 

[Pythor 1,354]

Kais lol... Yeah sorry about the long wait. I was gone on vacation for quite a while.. Chapter 5 is almost done as well. Expect more action and developments in there. Chapter 4 was kind of a set up/bridge chapter.

Edited October 30, 2018 by pythor20000

[Pythor 1,354]

@Flex... good to see you editing as well ;)

[Viking4s 10,791]

The best Chapter so far!
Getting better and better.

 

The password trick is not the best, every kid in town will try that, and I'm talking with real experience here.

[Person_Random 4,991]

Hey thor, keep working on desc dialogue, otherwise, great job!