5. Jax
JAX
Silently, I slip into Myles’s room and gently close the door behind me.
Breaking into the building was laughably easy, and so was sneaking up to his room. The building has cameras, but not enough of them, and there are massive blind spots that can be easily exploited to avoid detection.
The maintenance and operating costs of each house are covered by dorm fees and alumni donations, so most of the dorms get extensive renovations and security upgrades as new tech becomes available.
Boone House is the exception, and it has everything to do with the dorm being for first-gen students.
Unlike the other houses that were built by the families of their founding members, the school built Boone House when they started accepting first-gen students thirty years ago, and the alumni base hasn’t done much to level up anything in the building, including the security, over the years.
That’s bad news for Myles, but good news for whoever is after him.
“Are you in?” Jace asks, his voice coming through my earpiece.
“Yup,” I say in a low voice and look around, taking in every detail around me and committing it to memory. It’s exactly how I pictured the room based on the floor plans and what I’ve been able to see through his window.
“I’d say good job, but that feels condescending considering how easy it was for you to get in there,” he says, and I don’t need to see his face to know he’s grinning. “It’s like they want the first gens to get murdered in their beds.”
“Pretty sure the only thing they’d shed a tear over is the lost tuition checks if that did happen,” I agree and head over to Myles’s computer.
Thanks to our lifelong sibling rivalry and our pathological need to either one-up each other or at least learn everything the other does, I’m good with computers, but I’m nowhere near my brother’s level, and certainly not anywhere near Myles’s.
If it was anyone else, I’d snoop around myself to get answers, but with Myles’s skills, I need my brother’s help to make sure I get in and out without fucking things up and getting caught.
“Do you have the drive?” he asks.
“Obviously.” I pull it out of my pocket and slide the USB connector out of the protective metal casing.
“Then stick it in and let me work my magic.” He snickers. “That’s what he said.”
Being careful not to disturb anything on Myles’s desk, I fit the USB into the port on his computer tower.
The rest of the room is immaculately clean, but his desk looks like a disorganized mess.
I’d bet money that, like my brother, Myles knows exactly where everything is and there’s order to the chaos.
“All good?” I ask as the screen flashes to life. That should give Jace remote access to the system.
“Yuppers.” He snaps his gum loudly. “Shouldn’t take long to get what I need.”
“Just don’t get caught,” I tell him. “It’s not your ass on the line if you do.”
“Technically, it is,” he says with a soft laugh. “Your ass is genetically identical to mine, so we have the exact same ass.”
“Then hurry the fuck up and protect our ass so I don’t have to fight my way out of here.”
“Patience, dear brother.” He clucks his tongue disapprovingly. “Did anyone tell Michelangelo to hurry the fuck up when he was painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel?”
“I imagine they did, considering it took him four years to do it.” I turn away from the computer and look around the room again.
“Whatever,” he says dismissively. “My point still stands. You can’t rush genius.”
“Is genius in the room with us?” I ask as I walk over to Myles’s dresser.
“Nope, genius is in our room doing all the hard work while you sass him.”
I let out a soft laugh. “If you’re a genius, then so am I, thanks to those identical genes we have.”
“Touché.”
“Are you finding what you’re looking for?” I ask distractedly as I study the items on his dresser.
Myles’s room is almost completely devoid of any personalization outside of the little nook his computer is tucked into. There are no photos around or anything on the walls, and the only things he has on display are puzzles and an ornate glass chessboard.
On his dresser and next to the chess set are an intricate wooden cluebox and a disassembled wood conundrum puzzle.
There’s also an elaborate 3D metal puzzle of a dragon with massive wings on his tallboy dresser, along with a model of a grandfather clock, and there’s a cryptex puzzle on his bedside table.
He also has several Rubik's Cubes scattered on his desk.
I knew about the cubes and the cryptex puzzle from my observations, but I didn’t see the others since they were out of my line of sight.
I figured he was into puzzles after watching him scramble and solve Rubik's Cubes at his desk like they’re fidget spinners, but seeing the variety in his collection tells me he’s an enthusiast.
That makes two of us.
“Why did you go quiet?” Jace asks. “Are you just so overwhelmed with my brilliance that you were rendered speechless?”
“More like I’m giving you silence so you don’t fuck up and finish before we start collecting social security.”
“So sassy.” He makes a low tsk sound. “Careful with that mouth, or I’ll set off the fire alarms just to give you a challenge.”
“Like that would even slow me down.” I carefully pick up the puzzle box and turn it around in my hands. It’s handmade, and one of the most complicated I’ve ever seen. Based on the weight and how unbalanced it is, there’s something inside it.
I want to solve it and see what he’s hiding, but instead of giving in to the urge, I place it on the dresser, making sure to put it back the same way as I found it. I have no doubt I could solve the thing, but it would take a lot longer than however long Jace needs to finish.
“I could always put the building in lockdown at the same time if you want a bit of a challenge,” he offers.
“How about we stick to getting what we need and save the escape room challenge for next time?”
“Fine,” he agrees. “Have you planted the cameras?”
“Not yet.”
“Slacker. Do you need me to come down there and do your job for you too?”
“Keep sassing me and see what happens.” I look around, checking the angles to find the best vantage point for the camera to capture the entire room.
“Ooohhh, I’m shaking in my boots. Or at least I would be if I were wearing boots. And saying that I’m shaking in my socks doesn’t have the same oomph , so I’m sticking with it even if it’s not accurate.”
“That was a lot of words to say you’re underestimating my level of annoyance with you right now.”
He snort-laughs. “Or was it a lot of words to say bring it on, bro?”
“Potato, poh-tah-to,” I tell him and walk over to the tallboy dresser next to the closet.
It’s tucked into the corner and positioned high enough to cover the whole room. Satisfied that it’s the best place, I pull the camera Jace intercepted from the Kings out of my jacket pocket and flip open the box.
It’s about the same size as a 1x1 Lego plate piece with a thin, flexible antenna protruding from the back. It’s big enough that I can’t just plant it on the dresser, but I should be able to mount it inside the exposed gears of the model clock.
“I’m planting the first camera now,” I tell my brother as I pull a pair of long-handled tweezers out of the little fold in my jacket I slipped them into earlier. “How much time do you need?”
“A few minutes,” he says, all traces of his earlier jokes gone. “No more than five.”
Using the tweezers, I slip the camera between some of the gears and carefully wedge it against the frame. Once it’s secure, I tuck in the wire tail.
When I’m sure it’s not going anywhere, I step back and scan the clock to ensure it’s hidden, then adjust it so there’s no glare coming off the lens and pull out my phone to test that the camera is synced and working.
“Camera one is down,” I tell Jace.
“Awesomesauce,” he mutters. He’s distracted, which tells me he’s concentrating.
Instead of being a dick and bugging him while he’s working, I pull a small EMF meter out of my pocket and flip it on.
“Huh,” Jace mutters.
“What?” I ask as I use the reader to check the area around the dresser for any electronic signatures that shouldn’t be there. It’s possible that whoever is after him planted cameras or mics in here before I got involved.
“Looks like our boy is coming back from break early.”
“Yeah?” I ask, continuing my sweep of the room.
“Yup. His family got him special permission to be here the week before classes start up again. Doesn’t say why, but I’m sure I can find out when I have a chance to dig deeper.”
“That’s an interesting development,” I say.
“I’m picking up what you’re putting down. Don’t you worry about that,” he says distractedly. “There. I just did the same for us. Now we’ll be on campus at the same time as our boy.”
“Awesomesauce,” I say, keeping my eyes on the meter as I check around his bed and night tables.
“This is insane,” Jace mutters after a stretch of silence.
“What is?” I skip his desk and go to check his dresser.
“Nothing. I just thought I was paranoid. The levels of encryption in here are beyond anything I’ve ever seen. Every time I think I’ve gotten through one, there’s another one right there and waiting for me.”
“Is that his whole system, or just parts of it?”
If it’s just a small part that’s different, that could be a sign that there’s something worth finding there.
“The whole system.” He blows a bubble and pops it. “Like I said, bro is more paranoid than me.”
When I’m sure the dresser and the small sitting area next to it, including around the couch, are clear, I head back over to his desk. With all the equipment Myles has, trying to suss out an electronic signature that shouldn’t be there won’t be easy.
“This is going to take days, if not weeks, to go through,” Jace says, breaking the silence that fell over us. “Good thing I’ll have all the time in the world to work on this while we’re here during the break.”
“Good thing,” I say distractedly as I finish up my scan. Now I can focus on planting the second camera.
“I need about two minutes, then I’m done. What about you?” he asks.
“Checked the room, and it seems clean. I just need to get the second camera set up.” I pull another box from my pocket and shake out a spy cam.
This one is a bit smaller than the other and has a stiff antenna that can be bent and twisted to tuck it out of sight.
“Let me know when you’re done.”
“Roger that,” I say and pick up a small statue of a character from the video game Myles is always playing.
In all the time I’ve been watching him, this is the only thing on the desk that I’ve never seen him touch.
The character is wearing a black cape and black clothes, perfect for hiding a camera, and I fit it under the cape so the lens is peeking out from under the character’s arm.
The shadows from the cape and the fact that everything is black help the case blend in.
I weave the antennae around the hilt of one of the swords the character has strapped to his back to keep it out of sight.
When I’m sure everything is secure and hidden, I pull out my phone and sync it. I’m just tucking it away when I hear my brother’s voice.
“Looks like our friend is on the move. He just left the library.”
“How long do I have?” I ask and twist the base of the statue by about an eighth of an inch. Now it’s in the right place.
“About sixty seconds.”
“How long do you need before I can pull the drive?”
“Thirty seconds.”
“’Kay.” I cross my arms and fix my gaze on the screen as lines of code scroll by.
I can’t make out what Jace is doing because the code is moving too fast, but I keep an eye on it anyway while I wait for him to finish.
The screen goes dark.
“Done.”
At Jace’s word, I pull the flash drive out from the USB port and slip it in my pocket. With a final look around to make sure everything is exactly where I found it, I slip out of his room and lock the door behind me.
The door to the stairs opens just as I reach it, and Myles steps over the threshold, his eyes fixed on his phone.
“Excuse me.”
“No worries,” he mumbles, his eyes still on his phone as I slip past him.
The door bangs shut behind me, and I hurry down the stairs.
“All clear?” Jace asks as I push the back door open and step outside.
“All clear,” I tell him as I stride away from the building and toward the woods.
“Awesomesauce.” He snaps his gum again. “Want me to meet you at the cliffs?”
“Yeah,” I say. “I could use a climb.”
“Same, bro. Same.”
“See you in a few,” I tell him and head toward our climbing spot.
My phone feels like it’s burning a hole in my pocket, but I resist the urge to check the camera feeds.
I’ll look while I’m waiting for Jace. That’ll give me a chance to get rid of this weird excitement I’m feeling, the same excitement I felt when I saw Myles’s expression after I took out those dollar store thugs who attacked him on his run a few nights ago.
He should have been terrified of me, but instead he stared at me like I was some sort of vision from the heavens, and there was an undercurrent of something else there. Something dark and wild. And something that looked an awful lot like heat.
But the strangest part was how both of us were hard when I watched him run away.