Terror Kid (8 page)

‘What? Are you hacking the school or something?'

‘Let's just say – all you need to do is concentrate on what you're doing.'

‘OK. Here's what I'll do. I'll hack in, that will take a couple of seconds, and then I'll leave. Their website and Intranet will go down for ten minutes, but I'll just go back to school. The hack closes itself down anyway.'

‘That's what we need to hear. How much money do I owe you?'

Rico was quick to reply. ‘This is not about money. This is about us. I don't want any money. Just send some work my way when you can.'

‘Cool,' said Speech. ‘So we're on for tomorrow then?'

‘We're on.'

‘Good luck, my man,' said Speech, and then he was gone.

 

The first day of the new term started awkwardly. Mr Donavan, the head teacher, spent fifteen minutes addressing the school and talking about the evil people who went on the rampage over the holidays trying to bring society down. Without naming names he mentioned that he had heard that some of them were from this school, but he assured everybody assembled that there would be no riotous behaviour in this school. Then it was off to class and soon it was as if the holidays had never happened, and it was lunchtime.

As planned, Rico left school as soon as the lunch break began. When he got home his mother had just left to start her shift at work. There was still hot water in the kettle. He had reached home with enough time to make a sandwich and a cup of tea, and then he went upstairs. He had left everything on standby so had very little to do. He waited until it was one minute to one, then he typed in some code, and at one second to one he clicked on the mouse and watched it happen.

Peace sign.

Site down.

Sunflower.

Message:
YOU'RE UNDER ARREST
.

Intranet network down.

He smiled. He wanted to stay to see the laughing policeman, but he had to go. Then the doorbell rang. Rico began to panic.

‘Speech,' Rico said aloud. ‘It better not be him.'

He thought that maybe Speech had done the ultimate surprise appearance act, appearing at his home. He thought of looking out of the window, but he ran downstairs instead; he was heading that way anyway. He opened the door, convinced it would be Speech, but it was Karima. Rico sighed in relief, and then surprise.

‘What are you doing here?' he asked.

‘What are
you
doing here?' she said. ‘Why did you leave school? I was worried about you, brov. Thought something was wrong.'

‘Nothing's wrong,' said Rico. ‘I just had something to do. But it's good to know that you cared. Let's go.'

They rushed off back to school and as they parted to go to their classes they made a plan to meet that evening with some other friends and hang out on the streets. Rico thought that by then people would have heard about the various sites going down, or maybe the school site would have gone down too.

The school site didn't go down. Everything was quite normal, until the last lesson of the day. Rico was sitting at the back of the English class when Mr Donavan came in and spoke to Mrs Dovric, the English teacher. Mr Donavan used his hand to shield any words from straying in the direction of the pupils, but from the teachers' expressions it was easy to see that whatever they were talking about was serious. Mr Donavan then turned to the class, looked around and called Michelle Holland out. She was a quiet, blonde girl who nobody knew much about. She stood up and walked to the front of the room.

‘Now, class,' said Mrs Dovric. ‘I need to leave you alone for a few minutes. Read the passage we were just looking at and find as many punctuation mistakes as you can. I'll be back in a moment.'

All three left the room and for a moment there was silence, but then the class started to chatter. Most were wondering what Michelle Holland could have done that was wrong. She was such a good girl. Some started to make jokes saying that maybe she was a bad girl after all; they began to make fun of her. Rico just watched and listened.

Mrs Dovric returned, looking upset, but went straight back to her teaching as if nothing had happened. But one pupil shouted, ‘Is she in trouble, Miss? What has she done?'

‘Never you mind,' Mrs Dovric replied. ‘Michelle has had some very bad news, so remember, be nice to her. Now let's get back to work. We do English here, not gossip.'

By home time, word began to spread around the school. As he walked towards the gate Rico overheard one girl saying to another, ‘Did you hear about Michelle Holland? A bomb went off at the big police station in town and her dad was in there. He died. It's a shame, isn't it?'

Rico was shocked by what he had heard. He marched quickly to the girl and began to ask questions.

‘What happened?'

‘A bomb went off at that police headquarters place at lunchtime. Lots of people got killed. Michelle Holland's dad got killed.'

Rico's head started to heat up. ‘Are you sure?' He nervously bit on his bottom lip.

The girl spoke hurriedly. ‘Everyone's talking about it. It's on the Internet and everything. Her mum came and took her out of school. I saw them both crying their eyes out, getting into a police car.'

‘Thanks,' said Rico, walking away and going to a corner of the playground where he could be alone. He was trying to process what he had heard. A bomb, the hack: could there be a connection? He heard a familiar voice calling.

‘Rico. What you doing?'

Karima was running towards him. As soon as she got to him she put her arm around his shoulder and continued to speak. ‘You waiting for someone?'

‘No,' replied Rico.

‘So, be seeing you later then?'

‘Yes. What we going to do?' Rico asked, trying to sound interested.

‘Don't know. Maybe we can go into town.'

‘Have you heard about the bomb in town?' asked Rico.

‘Yes. But that will be all cleared up by tonight,' Karima said dismissively, but she could see that Rico was thinking deeply.

‘Hey. It wasn't me,' Karima said, laughing. ‘I told you I ain't on that any more. I'll come round and get you later.'

Karima walked off, leaving Rico on his own. Rico turned on his phone and began to walk home.

Rico's house was not far from the city centre and the police headquarters. He could hear the emergency vehicles as they tried to make their way through the traffic. When Rico arrived on Cavendish Road the first thing he saw was police cars, a long line of them. As he got closer he noticed they were near his house. He turned and walked the other way. As he did so his phone rang. It was his mother.

‘Rico. Where are you?'

‘What's the matter, Mum?'

‘Rico, what have you done?'

‘Nothing.'

‘The police are here. They're taking all your computers. Come home.'

Rico began to run in the opposite direction from his home. ‘I haven't done anything, Mum.'

‘I believe you. So come home then, son. The police are …'

Another voice came on the phone. It was a man's voice, but it wasn't his dad's.

‘Rico. Just give yourself up and we can sort this all out. We just need to talk to you.'

Rico ended the call. It rang again. Rico looked at the caller ID; this time it was Karima. He answered but she spoke so quickly he struggled to keep up with her.

‘Brov. The cops are after you. Some people are saying you blew up the cop shop. I said, no, not my Rico. They're saying you did some computer stuff and bombed up the place like you are some big terrorist or something. As if. Where are you, brov?'

Rico ended the call without speaking. He took a while to breathe, and then he turned his phone off. A bus drew up at a stop nearby. He didn't know where it was going, but he ran and got on it.

 

The bus arrived at a bus station and the few passengers who were left began to get off, but Rico waited until he was the last. He had no idea where he was until he saw a sign above the ticket office. West Bromwich Bus Station. It was busy, mainly with local schoolchildren making their way home. Rico was hungry. He didn't understand what was happening – he was wanted, he was desperate, but the people around him were carrying on as normal. He had very little money. He thought of buying something to eat, but that would leave him with even less money, and unless he gave himself up he was going to need a bus fare. Then Rico had an idea. There was a trip he had wanted to make for a long time. Maybe this was the time to make it. He tried to avoid eye contact with anyone as he walked around the bus station. He found a map, identified the bus he needed and got on it. When he got off the bus he had to make his way from memory. He was too scared to ask anyone for directions but after a few wrong turns he found the road he was looking for. He hesitated in front of the house. It was such a long shot, but he realised he would soon look suspicious if he continued to just stand outside looking at the house. So he walked up and rang the bell. A woman in her early twenties answered. Rico recognised her, and to his relief, she recognised him straight away.

‘Rico. What a surprise. What are you doing here?'

‘Hi Kim. I need to find Lola,' he said.

‘Why don't you just call her?' she said. ‘Haven't you got her number, or is she still not on speaking terms with the family?'

‘I've got no problem with her, but I don't have her number, and I just need to find her fast.'

Kim was a friend of Rico's sister, Lola. She invited Rico in, but Rico wanted to know that he wasn't wasting his time.

‘Do you know where she is, or not?'

‘Of course I do,' said Kim. ‘Come in.'

‘I can't stay long,' said Rico.

‘You can stay for as short or as long as you like,' she said, guiding Rico into the living room. Rico walked in and to his surprise, there was his sister Lola, sitting on the floor eating a pizza out of a box. She jumped up and hugged him.

‘Rico! What's up, little brother?'

‘What are you doing here?' Rico couldn't believe his eyes.

‘I live here now. Decided to move in with my friend, didn't I? She needed some company, and we were spending most of our time together anyway. But the real question is, what are you doing here?'

Rico looked at Kim, unsure if he should say anything, so he just said, ‘I've got problems.'

‘And I've got to go out,' said Kim, sensing that Rico might appreciate some time to talk to his sister alone.

When Kim left the house Lola offered Rico a piece of her pizza, then watched as he ate the rest of it at speed. Rico told Lola everything, and when she asked questions he answered them as honestly as he could. Until Rico's arrival she had not heard of the bombing. She told Rico that she and Kim had a television set but very rarely used it. She turned it on, and almost every station was covering the incident. They both sat down and watched in horror as they viewed the scene of the bombing. News reporters from all over the world were standing in front of cameras. In the background the destroyed police headquarters could be seen, with the whole of the reception area blown out. Firefighters had just put out what remained of the fire, rubble was spread all over the road, and staff that had been trapped in the building were being led out. Many of them were injured.

Lola's jaw dropped, she shook her head, and tears ran down Rico's face.

The police had no doubts. They told the media that they were looking for Rico Federico, the young mastermind behind the bomb plot. He was reported as being a computer fanatic and very anti-police. It was also said that he had links to an Islamic group and could have been working on their behalf. The police were desperate to find Rico and so they released a narrative of what they believed had happened.

“From the activities recorded in his computer we can see that Rico Federico had been spying on the police, and so he knew the exact time, each week, when sterile equipment would be delivered by courier to the headquarters for use by scenes of crime officers. For security reasons this equipment is X-rayed and scanned in by bar code, but when the equipment arrived this afternoon it could not be processed because our computers were down. We can see from his computer records that it was Rico Federico who compromised our computer systems. After placing the delivery on the counter, the courier told the officer that he had to go back to his vehicle to call his office and notify them of a possible delay. We now know that this courier was an imposter, the real courier having been delayed by a deliberate accident. The imposter went back to his vehicle, but drove off, and exactly one minute later the bomb went off. Neither the imposter nor the vehicle can be traced. This was a well-planned, professionally executed operation. Rico Federico is a dangerous person. We believe he is still in the Birmingham area. The public are warned not to approach him if they see him, but to report any sighting of him to the police.”