he'll have his laptop?"
"Oh, yeah, he always does," says Phil. "And he's always on it."
Phil explains about the special router password for the bar area and Andy nods, smiling deviously. Then he explains his plan. They all grin and nod approvingly.
Finally, Jim says, "Ok, we better get going if we're gonna get set up by the time Bader goes to dinner. Andy, have you got what you need with you, tool-wise, that is?"
"You think there's anything missing from my traveling electrical engineering lab slash love van? You gotta be kidding!"
"Love van?" smirks Ryan.
"It could happen."
"Lets go, I'm getting nauseous," says Jim rising.
Phil says, "I gotta get going. When you guys get there, park out back near my car. Text me when you're there."
Time: 6:30 PM
Ryan, Ben and Andy drive in Andy's van to the Carrington and park in the employee lot next to Phil's car which is located behind some tall, decorative shrubs. They text Phil who scurries out. Just in time, Ryan slides open the van door and Phil hops in.
"Ok, Bader will be down in a few minutes, if he keeps to his pattern."
"So, Andy, you got everything?" asks Phil.
"Yep," says Andy pointing at his laptop bag.
"Good, lets get going."
"Ryan, you and Jim go in the lobby and wait a few minutes until I get Andy setup. Then come to the bar and sit at the stools at the far end. From there, you can watch both the floor and Bader's balcony," says Phil.
Andy pulls back the van's window curtain and peeks out to see if anyone is watching. The coast is clear. Andy and Phil head towards the rear service entrance.
A few minutes later Ryan and Jim walk to the front entrance and then wander around the pool area giving the place a good looking-over before heading to the bar.
Phil gives Andy a quick walking tour, pointing out the balconies above the huge glass covered central atrium. In the center is a large swimming pool together with several jet baths and hot tubs. Around the outside are tropical plants and trees arranged in small groves with bubbling waterfalls and tiny fairy lights in the branches. In these groves are tables, couches and chairs for dining or casual conversation. The Tiki themed bar area is near the center where the pool ends and the tropical rain forest begins.
Above are three levels of guest rooms facing the center with balconies overlooking the forest below. The priciest of these, the penthouse suites, are on the third level. Each of these has a private balcony with a sliding glass door that opens out onto the atrium. Entrance to these suites is from an inside corridor. On the lower two floors, however, the rooms have no balconies. They open onto a corridor with a railing that overlooks the atrium. Bader's room is one of the penthouse suites.
Returning to the bar, Phil opens the inconspicuous door to the network closet. Once inside the cramped room, Andy flips on the light and looks around.
Outside, Phil ties on his apron just as Ryan and Jim arrive at the bar area. He nods towards some stools at the far end where they go and seat themselves. He walks over to take their order, pours a couple of drinks, places them on the bar then leans forward and whispers, "Bader's suite is the one near the middle on the top floor."
As he speaks, the sliding door to the balcony in question opens. Bader strides out and surveys the forested pool, restaurant, and bar area far below. Ryan gestures and Phil turns to look.
"Yep, that's him. He should be down here in a minute, if all goes according to schedule."
Bader turns and retreats back into his room, leaving the balcony door open. A few minutes later the elevator dings and he strolls out into the atrium where he selects a secluded table with a thicket of ficus trees behind him but in full view of the bar. He opens his brief case.
At once they see the laptop.
"Win!" whispers Ryan.
As the laptop powers up, Bader plugs in the external power brick to a wall socket just behind the table. Then he nods to Phil who reaches beneath the bar for a WiFi password card.
Circling around the bar, he walks over to Bader's table and, handing him the card, and politely asks, "What can I get you sir? The usual?"
"Right, scotch and soda and some peanuts."
"Yes sir, coming right up," says Phil as he heads back to the bar.
Phil pours the drink then goes behind the bar and scoops up a bowl of peanuts. He takes the drink and bowl on a tray back to Bader's table.
Bader looks up and says, "Ahh, thanks, that looks good."
He returns to the bar where Ryan has texted Andy that Bader has started his laptop.
Inside the closet, Andy has attached his own router in place of the hotel's. He connects it through his laptop to the hotel's Ethernet backbone. Ryan's text message appears on the screen. Now he carefully watches the network display graph. A moment later he intercepts Bader entering his WiFi password. Andy strikes.
His system authenticates Bader's laptop and begins capturing all it's signals. At first, nothing unusual, a few web queries about news, weather, the stock market, nothing encrypted.
Andy starts inserting driveby malware into the browser data stream. Soon he has his own software running on Bader's laptop.
Then Bader calls up his email service. Andy strikes again, simulating the email service. By now Andy's software has replaced Bader's laptop's security authentication certificates. Andy can now use a standard man-in-the-middle hack.
Bader thinks he's talking to his email service but he's really talking to Andy's laptop which, in turn, is relaying the messages to the email server but copying each of them as well. Andy has now captured Bader's email password which, if Bader is like most people, is probably the same password he uses on many other services.
Next Andy initiates a port scan on Bader's laptop looking for any running services that are listening to the Internet. He finds many and several are easy hacks. Jackpot: unpatched OpenSSL: heartbleed! Yeah! He injects more malware.
Then the gold mine! Bader initiates the VPN circuit, his encrypted virtual private network. Again, relying on hacked security certificates, Andy captures the logon data.
Bader starts his decryption software which opens the laptop's encrypted file system. Andy is running a keyboard logger which promptly records Bader's password. Bader is totally pwned.
The encrypted file system is actually a large file on the laptop within which are many hidden files. Andy initiates transfer of the entire encrypted file collection from Bader's laptop to his. It's big and it will take some time. He texts Jim and tells them it may take a while so keep Bader happy and stationary.
Jim and Ryan order another round of drinks and watch Bader type away, oblivious that his life, by now, is an open book.
The elevator dings. Out walks Mark. A paranoid by nature, he repeatedly looks around as if he expects to be attacked. He walks over to Bader's table. Phil grins and texts Andy. Andy turns on Bader's camera and microphone. Double pwned, total pwnage!
Andy sends the audio from Bader's laptop to his phone and conference calls Jim, Ryan and Phil.
Mark slips into the chair that he's moved next to Bader's. Instinctively, his eyes continue to nervously dart around the room looking for threats, oblivious to the laptop which is now a mortal enemy. Bader signals to Phil for a round of scotches. Phil puts down his phone, gets the drinks, a wicker basket of pretzels, peanuts and chips and makes his delivery.
After Phill returns to the bar, Bader, smiling blandly moves his hand over his mouth and asks, "How are we doing? Are we all ready to pull this off?"
In a low voice, Mark, also with his hand over his mouth, says, "I just talked with Washington and everything's go. The weapons, the ammo, the agents they've secretly moved into the rebel states, all are in place and ready."
"I guess all those constitutional types who wondered why we were buying bullets by the billion will soon get their answer?" chuckles Bader as he takes another mouthful of scotch. "DeWitt wants this done fast, no survivors."
"So, what set her off? Why now?"
"She had no choice. Either move now or it was all over. As long as the Convention was split, there was still time. But when they finally came to an agreement with the confederationalists and finished their constitution, no more time. Now they're ready to ratify it. We can't afford anymore delays. We've ran out of options. Once they ratify it, DeWitt is toast. The military, what's left of it, the civil service, the courts, even the f'ing Post Office will desert her. She can't allow that."
"But couldn't she just run to be president of the new government?"
"Yeah, she's real popular. Like that will happen."
"She won before?"
"The results were rigged. The new constitution makes it impossible for her big city political machine allies to fix the vote as they've did. If she runs under the new constitution, she loses. Her only alternatives are to strike now or secede with a rump country consisting of Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, Maryland, New Jersey, Delaware, the District of Columbia, the only places other than California, that still support her. And those places are all welfare basket cases. No, she needs the inland states to keep things afloat. Her states don't produce any food, industrial goods, raw materials. Just nutty left wing moonbats and, God knows, she has enough of them already. She knows that if she doesn't retain control of the inland states, it's all over."
"What about California? They support her."
"California is too far away. It would either be forced to go it on its own, become part of Mexico, or join the Free