“How come you picked Kyle?” Mac asked.
“Like that equals rocket science? Found the vid of your teach on some wronged women’s dating site, then browsed your school’s online yearbook for a current student that mirror-pic’ed the girl in the vid. Two girls fit. You belonged to more extracurrics. It meant you had more Woofer vids to choose from. You and me became connected two weeks ago. Nothing personal.”
No, that couldn’t be it. “Nothing personal”? That was why this had all happened to me? Because Jonah had randomly selected the girl on the left instead of the girl on the right? I wondered who the other girl was, the girl whose life was almost ruined instead of mine.
“Lying,” Sharma said, without looking up from her Doc.
“My guess,” Rory said, “is you also picked Kyle because of her.”
A G-File for a girl named Ananda Stevens came up on-screen. Jonah shifted in his seat. He coughed and bits of cake flew onto the coffee table.
“What about her?” Sharma’s lips pursed.
A folder on Jonah’s desktop labeled Homework opened to reveal another folder, which led to another and then another. Suddenly there was the photo of the girl with all the retouched bruises marring her face. The thing about high school was it all felt so personal. Every slight felt specifically, solely crafted for you. And the only thing worse than your “unique” agony was the belief that no one else had to deal with anything as bad. So you wildly inflicted slights of your own. I saw how impossible it was. No one would ever escape high school unscathed.
“You’re sick,” Mac said.
Jonah reached across me and grabbed Sharma’s Doc. With her PHD in his hand, he looked capable of breath for the first time. Mac immediately launched himself at Jonah, like he’d only been waiting for a reason. As they tussled, Jonah swiped at Sharma’s Doc, then in a loud voice said, “Home hub, reboot. Enable backup pass code. Okay, okay, here.”
Mac let go. Jonah handed Sharma her Doc back. I gathered this meant Jonah had regained control of his house.
As the system rebooted, he said, “Our moms worked together. I was her first friend when she moved to Philly middle of sophomore year. She was so shy she barely spoke in school, so I built her worlds to roam. But then she ‘blossomed’ over the summer and made friends with some of the pretty girls and suddenly it was all about needing space. As soon as junior year came, she couldn’t wait to go off and play in more hi-def pastures. You aren’t supposed to just drop people like that.”
“Jonah,” I said. “I’m not Ananda.”
“It’s pronounced with a long A.”
“I couldn’t give a swipe,” I said. “I’m not her. She’s not me. We’re not all the same. You’re not just screwing over a teacher, who at least in my case was innocent; you’re hurting us. And we never did anything to hurt you. Delete it—now. All of it. My video, the other girls’ videos, everything.”
“Fine. All right. It doesn’t matter to me. I’ve already been paid anyway.”
Once the hub was back up, we watched as he swiped through, deleting source files.
“Your profiles might as well make you the same. Tens of thousands of friends. Vids without a care in the world. Clothes, shoes, boys.” He snapped his fingers. “Now I remember why I picked you. You do that stupid air-kiss thing with your Docs. How annoying can you get?”
“So I’m annoying. What you’re doing is terrorism.”
“Oh, boo-hoo.” Jonah selected the source file for the vid of me and Mr. E. and clicked Trash. “Did pretty rich girl not get a date? Did I mess with her shopping? There. It’s deleted. Are you happy?”
I looked at my G-File on my Doc. The video was still the first thing attached to my name.
“No. It’s still there.”
“Not possible.”
Using his Doc, Jonah brought up the video on the home hub.
“What does that mean?” Mac asked. “You have it stashed somewhere else?”
“No,” Sharma said. “It means someone else downloaded it before Dr. Graff removed it, and then that person stuck a DRM on it.”
“You have got to be kidding me!” I shouted.
From the kitchen we heard Mrs. Logan say, “Oh dear. Everything okay, JoJo?”
Her son gave his evil-villain laugh again. “Everything’s great, Ma. See? I told you it wasn’t me. I only posted the vid to your school’s website. I never linked it to YurTube. How unlucky are you? Someone really has it out for you.”
“But the money to buy all this tech in your house…”
“It came from hard-earned hacks. Safe America pays me pocket change compared to what I make off of my other fields of expertise. Actually, this equals plagiarism. Whoever reposted that vid is making dollar signs that should be coming to me. That’s my content. I oughta sue. How come you haven’t found out their IP address and leveled their ass?”
“They used GoFetch to reroute the IP,” I said.
“So crack the GoFetch reroute.”
“With what?” Rory asked.
Sharma’s head was already whipping up to stare at Jonah, like Don’t even tell me…
He withered under her gaze, but smiled and said, “Don’t feel bad; the South Koreans don’t even know I have this. Where’d you say it was rerouted through?”
“NY Public Library at Forty-Second Street,” Sharma said.
“Uh-huh, only three GoFetch users found at that site in the week before and after the vid posted.”
Jonah’s fingers flicked and swiped at his Doc so ridiculously fast, it didn’t seem possible he was doing anything other than pretending. But a click later, a computerized receipt for a GoFetch modem along with a name and billing address came up on-screen.
“Ta-da. This one cross-lists with your school. Ring any bells?”
Sharma, unimpressible Sharma, RL gasped. I felt numb and vindicated and like I wanted to use one of Jonah’s hologram generators and send myself back to Brooklyn to immediately wreak some havoc. This was what I’d been expecting. Not some kid in Philly—someone who knew me better than anyone else. Finally, everything made sense.
“Whoa. Oh, whoa,” Mac said. “That little bruja.”
“That one’s for free,” Jonah said. “You’re welcome.”
Mac’s hands clenched into fists. The veins in his arms popped. Just knowing he wanted to crush something as badly as I did made me feel a hundred times better.
“There’s a car waiting out front?” Mrs. Logan poked her head back in. “I wish you kids would have told me you took a cab here. I could have driven you all home.”
On our way out, Rory handed Jonah a business card. “Better options out there, man.”
“Corporate? No way.”
Rory shrugged. “It’s a stepping-stone, plus three meals a day, and you get to bring your dog to work. Besides, I’m going to keep checking back on you.”
“Is that a threat?” Jonah snorted, as I txted Sharma,
moi He’s offering him a job?
sharm He might have just saved the world. Hacker with God and Napoleon complex = cyber ow.