DePresti pointed at the rocket he had recently drawn. “I vote OuterTek. I know them intimately, I spent years working in their facility, and I think we can get some information out of them that we won’t out of any of the other players. The launch team has to know everything about the payload — RF frequencies that it’s sensitive to, shock environments, software interfaces, et cetera. OuterTek maintains all of that information in huge databases that anyone with access to their internal networks can get into.”
“And you can get into those networks?” Parkowski asked.
“Yes, but I think I can only do that from on-site,” he answered. “My VPN access is no longer valid, but I’ve heard that they keep user accounts around for far longer than they have to.”
“Not the worst idea in the world,” Chang said, “but I’ve got a different solution.”
He put his vape pen down and got up, then pointed to the NASA ground station at White Sands that handled the MICS terminal. “I’ve worked with NASA before and they are a bunch of idiots. All of them. Diversity and legacy hires with no idea how to do ‘space’ in the twenty-first century. Their security is probably atrocious.”
“What are we going to learn there that we haven’t already?” Parkowski argued. “I’ve seen the MICS logs.”
“But I haven’t,” Chang said, “and I’d love to take a look at them.”
“As would I,” DePresti added.
Parkowski shook her head. “I think the first place to look is here,” she said as she pointed at her own freshly-drawn oval. “Panspermia makes video games, they’re not a defense contractor or government agency. They don’t even have the word ‘security’ in their vocabulary.”
“That… that actually makes a lot of sense,” Chang said. “Nintendo got hacked just last year and the source code for a whole bunch of Pokémon games got released out into the wild. They apparently had a repository which was using an old version of version-control software that had an exploit already out and floating around. The software’s developer had patched it, Nintendo just hadn’t bothered to install the fix because they don’t care about security. And that’s
“There’s a history of video game companies being hacked,” DePresti continued. “Valve, Microsoft, Sony, EA, Capcom, they’ve all been hacked in the last twenty years or so. I think the number of creative types there fosters a collaborative environment, which is good for development, but not much so for security.”
“Sounds like a weak spot,” Chang said.
Parkowski frowned. “But, do we need to go in person?”
DePresti tilted his head towards her. “What do you mean?”
“I think White Sands is out, at least for now,” the Aering engineer replied. “That’s a multi-day trip, and the other two locations are just a few hours away. But, you said we need to go in person to OuterTek. We don’t to access Panspermia.”
Chang smiled and rocked back and forth slowly. “I like how you think.”
She turned to her boyfriend. “Can you get me into the OuterTek plant, or do I need to wait in the car?”
DePresti thought for a moment. “Shoot, I’m not sure if I can get you in,” he said slowly. “Aering is part of the American Rocket Alliance, OuterTek’s main competitor for government launch contracts, and I doubt they’re just going to let you in. However, their Wi-Fi is notoriously open. I bet if you have a laptop in the parking lot you could get access. I’ll write down the passwords and one of them should work.”
Parkowski shrugged, a painful gesture with her injured shoulder. “Works for me.”
“Great,” Chang said as he clasped his hands together. “It’s about four o’clock now, it’ll take me the better part of today and tomorrow to get everything together. How about we spend tomorrow planning and making sure that we have everything ready, and then you two drive into Hawthorne bright and early?”
DePresti and Parkowski ate a quick dinner of Chang’s leftovers, which were surprisingly good, while he made some phone calls. Chang came back while they were finishing up and doing the dishes in the dilapidated house’s kitchen.
“So, good news first,” he said while getting a frozen dinner out of the refrigerator. “I’ve got a guy who will come and fix up your car. He’ll do all of the work here, no questions asked, as long as he’s paid in cash.”
“How much does he want?” DePresti asked.
“Thousand bucks for labor, plus parts,” Chang replied. “I’ll cover you until you can pay me back.”
“Thanks,” DePresti said with a smile.
“But that’s going to take a while,” Chang said. “Which is the bad news.”
“How long?” Parkowski asked.
“Three to four weeks. Mostly for him to get all of the parts together.”
“Damn,” Parkowski said. “So if the Subaru is out of commission, how do we get back to the city?”
“I’ve got two trucks, you guys can take the Chevy,” Chang responded. “It’s older, and has a lot of miles on it, but works great.”
