The Alpha Drive Read online

  “Lucky me,” she muttered.

  “You have a nice day now, Ms. Parker,” he said as he turned on his heel to walk toward the next car in line.

  “How did you know—?” she stopped, realizing he was too far out of earshot.

  How had he known her name?

  She sighed and took her foot off the brake, letting the car roll along the street. Emery eyed her rearview mirror, watching as the traffic guard spun the dial on his radio. Maybe her eyes were playing tricks on her, but she could have sworn she saw him mouth the words, “She’s here,” into his headset.

  2

  “Are we in?”

  Torin Porter keyed in the final HTML code, his fingers flying against the virtual keyboard as the last sixteen digits blinked before him on the system’s holostation. He lifted his hands and swiped his index and middle fingers across the air to make contact with the virtual screen.

  As he scrolled through the numerous pages of code he’d written, he realized it was probably best to review it line by line. His successful hacks up to this point included TCP ports 21 and 25, but TCP port 22 was giving him some trouble. After so many attempts, errors tended to blur together, making them almost impossible to spot.

  Halfway through the review, his vision grew fuzzy. Torin closed his eyes and shook his head in an attempt to refocus, but it was no use. The numbers and letters swirled together. He may as well just launch the program, errors and all.

  With his index finger, Torin pressed the INITIATE button. The system beeped as hundreds of database screens appeared. He could only hope that he’d be granted access into each one. That last firewall was hard to beat.

  “Porter, did you hear me?”

  Torin swiveled around in his holopod, the rotation smooth and fluid, even though he was suspended about three feet in the air. He’d almost forgotten that someone else was in the room with him. His eyes locked on the one man he wasn’t prepared to face just yet.

  The Commander.

  “I heard you, sir. I’m almost in.” He spun away from the Commander’s unnerving stare, the scar on his left cheek more prominent than the last time Torin had seen him. The history of the scar was a mystery, but everyone, including him, was too afraid to ask. So, he continued to walk on eggshells, just like every other employee in the building.

  Torin diverted his attention back to the horde of flashing images as the final firewall for TCP Port 22 appeared. He shifted his pod closer to the screen. “This is it,” he muttered under his breath.

  He knew not to get his hopes up with all the failures he’d experienced recently. Breaking into the Federal Commonwealth’s mainframe was a top priority for the Seventh Sanctum and, of course, he’d been the one tasked with the nearly impossible assignment. Although Torin was new to the organization, his credentials in “hackerdom” and holotechnology made him a prime candidate for this sort of work. So was the burden of being inherently tech-savvy.

  Torin watched dejectedly as bright red letters appeared on the screen. ACCESS DENIED.

  He clenched his jaw, his hands curling into fists. I really thought I had it this time. Sadly, the result wasn’t all that surprising. Another attempt. Another failure.

  The Commander sighed as he headed back toward the sliding glass doors. “We’re running out of time. I don’t know how many times I have to tell you—you’re the best there is, but I’m starting to lose faith. You need to figure this out, and quick, before we lose our window of opportunity.”

  Torin lowered his head, hoping his shaggy chestnut hair would hide the defeat in his eyes. “Understood, sir.”

  “Let me know when you have something worth reporting.”

  The Commander stormed out of the room, leaving Torin to mull over his failure in silence. He gazed around at the stark white walls. Government institution or mental asylum? Lately, it’d started to feel like the latter.

  Of course, with every failure came an inescapable time for self-reflection. The burning question he could never seem to answer? Why he’d joined the Seventh Sanctum in the first place.

  Torin had been recruited four years ago, while he was still in middle school. Still a child. His real name was actually Sam Moore. His biological parents had given him up for adoption before he was even a year old. He’d transferred in and out of different orphanages, but at the lucky age of seven, his foster parents, the Porters, had adopted him. And so he became Sam Porter.

  From that point forward, he was immersed in a world of luxury and technology—very different from the used toys and raggedy hand-me-down clothes at the orphanages. His parents loved him, but time never seemed to be on his side. They were always jet-setting off to another continent. With an empty house and a babysitter that didn’t care, Torin taught himself how to use the one thing he never had access to in the orphanage. Computers. Or, more specifically, how to hack into computers.

  He’d started with the basics—websites and small shop security systems—his knowledge only growing the more his parents were away. Then, on his tenth birthday, he’d received news that turned his entire world upside down. His parents’ plane had crashed. And there were no survivors.

  As a minor, he should have been placed back into foster care, but Torin didn’t want to go back. He hacked into all of the government databases and erased any trace of Sam Moore and Sam Porter, then gave himself a new identity with a new name: Torin Porter.

  He’d considered changing his last name for security reasons, but keeping alive the memory of his foster parents was more important. He couldn’t give up hacking, not at a time like that, so instead of starting high school like everyone else, he found a job with the Seventh Sanctum. Torin started as a low-level hacker, but after proving himself time and time again, he quickly moved his way up the ranks to Corporal. His latest assignment required him to break into the Federal Commonwealth’s mainframe and pull some information that would contribute to another segment of the mission. That was all he’d been told.

  At first, it seemed as though he was just a pawn in a larger game, until one afternoon when he’d overheard a discussion between the higher-ups. Well, not so much overheard as hacked into. It was tough working day in and day out, not knowing if what he was doing would contribute to something worthwhile in the long run. Fortunately, his concerns were put to rest.

  The discussion he’d eavesdropped on was one between the Commander and his subordinates. The military jargon was difficult to understand, but the overall message was clear: people were trapped and it was 7S’s responsibility to get them out.

  Where these people were trapped, Torin had not the slightest idea. Why they were trapped—well, that was an even bigger mystery. But at least his thirty-seven failed attempts weren’t wasted on nothing. These people, whoever and wherever they were, needed him, and he wasn’t going to give up that easily.

  Torin cracked his knuckles and rolled his neck as a blank template appeared on the screen. Back to square one. He took a deep breath, hoping that maybe he would get it right this time around.

  Thirty-eighth time’s a charm, right?

  3

  The encounter with the traffic guard played over and over again in Emery’s head as she drove down the narrow street. It was probably just a figment of her imagination. Maybe the traffic guard had informed the Resident Assistant that she’d arrived. Or maybe they’d met somewhere before.

  Highly unlikely.

  She shook off the eerie feeling and brought the car to an abrupt halt, looking out the window at the horrendous structure before her. Piles of faded brick lay desolately on the sidewalk. The doors to the entrance of Rosemary Hall were painted two different colors—one tan, the other a deep brown—and there were still strips of blue tape where the painting was unfinished. It was almost as if the administration had started some renovations and suddenly decided to stop halfway through.

  Alexis’s stunned expression mirrored her own. “Well, maybe it’s not so bad on the inside.” She climbed out of the car, peering into the deeply t
inted windows of the backseat. “You’re on the third floor, right?” she asked as she walked over to the main entrance. She opened the doors to the lobby, then disappeared from sight. After two minutes, she returned, the expression on her face dismal. “Oh, Emery. You’re not going to like this.”

  “I’m not going to like what?”

  “Your dorm . . . it doesn’t have any elevators.”

  Emery groaned. Of course. She would be the one to get the outdated building with no elevators. “That’s alright,” she said, trying to hide her disappointment. “See all of those people in gold and maroon shirts?” Her eyes shifted to the horde of people bustling in the parking lot. “I’m pretty sure they’re here to help. They have full-size bins with wheels and everything.”

  “If you say so.” Alexis rolled her eyes and walked to the back of the car. She popped the trunk and began to unload box after box of clothes, muttering to herself why any girl would possibly need this many pairs of shoes and jeans.

  Emery smiled, trying not to laugh, when a sea of students in maroon and gold shirts caught her attention. Many of their shirts were plain, but a number of them had large logos stitched on the sleeves. Her gaze shifted to a row of buildings across the street as more students appeared. They didn’t look like residence halls, and she wondered if they were administrative buildings of some sort.

  A deafening slam invaded her eardrums, causing her to jump like a horse that had been spooked one too many times. She couldn’t help but direct a harsh stare at her sister.

  “What?” Alexis asked, resting her hands on the trunk of the car. “Don’t look so jolted. Grab some stuff from the backseat and I’ll go find some bins.”

  By the time they’d filled up four of the bins, there wasn’t a gold or maroon shirt in sight. As they rolled the oversized bins through the dorm lobby, Emery couldn’t help but frown. The entire building looked like it was under construction. There were concrete and plaster-covered walls everywhere, paint chips scattering the floor amongst piles of overflowing garbage bags. But the smell was the worst, like multiple sewage pipes had sprung leaks and hadn’t been repaired yet. How could they let students move in when the lobby was hardly even functional?

  I pray to god this isn’t what my room looks like.

  They stopped at the front desk, a chipper woman greeting them for check-in. She jotted down Emery’s information, then pulled a shiny black key card and a gold room key from her desk drawer. The woman scanned the card to activate it, then handed both items to Emery. “Room 319 will be through the door on the right on the third floor. Welcome to Darden.”

  Emery thanked her and proceeded to a glass door with a large paper cut-out of the letter C taped messily to the window, as if a kindergartner had been given too much leeway during arts and crafts time. She searched the door for a second, noticing a small black box next to the doorframe with a little red light above it. A faint beep sounded as she swiped the card over the access reader, the light turning green.

  They maneuvered the bins into the dimly lit stairwell, cringing at the sound of screeching voices and echoing footsteps from the floors above. The yellowish-green lights emphasized the black scuffs on the walls from the numerous move-ins and move-outs the dorm had accommodated over the years, and the once white tile looked like it hadn’t been scrubbed in centuries.

  “So much for getting help,” Alexis scoffed. “How are we going to carry all of this? And up three flights of stairs, mind you?”

  Emery tried to stay positive, but the situation was progressively growing worse by the minute. “You stay here with the bins,” she instructed. “I’m going to take a few things upstairs and unlock the door. I guess we’ll just take turns. That way, my stuff won’t be left unattended.”

  “Are you crazy? That’ll take us forever to get unloaded!” Alexis whined.

  “Well, if someone in a maroon or gold shirt happens to waltz down this marvelous staircase, feel free to ask them for help,” she retorted. “I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”

  Emery grabbed her iron, a lamp, and a bag of cleaning supplies from the bin and started the trek upstairs. With aching thighs, she finally reached the third floor and pushed through the worn wooden door that led to the hallway corridor. The hallway was just as poorly lit as the stairwell, lined with the same yellowish-green lighting. The stench of stale pizza and moldy cardboard boxes filled her nostrils. Gross.

  Her experience up to this point went against everything she’d heard about boarding school in general. She’d expected grand residence halls with new fixtures, and renovated dorm rooms with the latest technology. A building with elevators, at the very least.

  This was the exact opposite of that.

  As Emery continued down the hallway, she realized it was eerily quiet for what was supposed to be a chaotic move-in day. The door numbers increased with every step, the even numbered rooms on the left and odd numbered rooms on the right. She held her breath as she walked down the hall, exhaling once she reached her room, number 319. The door was slightly ajar, so she gently pushed it open with her foot. In the middle of the room stood a brunette, sporting a fitted black vest and jean shorts. Her bracelets and bangles jingled as she spun around excitedly at the sound of the door opening. At the same time, an older female and male poked their heads out from behind a closet door and smiled. Emery made a quick calculation, presuming that this was her roommate, accompanied by her mom and her dad.

  “Finally!” the brunette exclaimed. “You must be Emery. I’ve been waiting to meet you all day. I’m Rhea.” She rushed over and embraced her new roommate in a tight hug. Emery attempted to hug back, trying to balance her belongings in her already occupied arms.

  Rhea pulled away, the smell of coconut and lime lingering in the air. She grinned, showing off her flawless, pearly white teeth. Emery felt overwhelmed and mesmerized all at once.

  “Silly me, let me get that for you,” Rhea offered as she unloaded Emery’s arms and turned to place the items on a nicely polished desk. Emery was quick to notice a bed situated overhead, realizing it was actually all one unit. A desk and a bed in one. How convenient.

  “Oh, I almost forgot. These are my parents. You can just call them Mom and Dad.”

  “Hi,” Emery waved, feeling entirely uncomfortable. “It’s nice to meet you.”

  At that moment, Alexis appeared in the doorway with not one, but all four of the bins. “What’s taking you so long?” she huffed. “I finally found someone to help us.” She nodded her head at the tall, lanky kid next to her. “Thanks for your help, Tyler.”

  Emery smiled at the boy as he walked away, then cleared her throat to indicate that they weren’t alone.

  Alexis peered around the doorframe, then nudged her sister, clearly wanting an introduction. Emery tried not to roll her eyes. “This is my sister, Alexis.”

  “Nice to meet you, Alexis.” Rhea’s attention shifted to the bins in the doorway. “It looks like you lugged a lot up those stairs. Did your parents help you?”

  “Actually, our parents aren’t helping me move in,” Emery interjected. “Just my sister.”

  Rhea’s parents exchanged quizzical looks, which made Emery feel even more uncomfortable, but Rhea was unfazed. “Is that all of your stuff? Or is there more?”

  “I think there might be four more bags in the car,” Emery replied, turning toward her sister for confirmation.

  “Mom, Dad, would you mind helping them bring up the rest of Emery’s things?” Rhea asked sweetly. “Alexis may never leave if it’s just the two of you. Poor girl’s probably tired already.”

  “Of course, sweetheart,” her dad responded as he placed a hand on his daughter’s shoulder.

  Emery couldn’t help but feel a twinge of jealousy. They seemed like the picture perfect family. A pit formed in her stomach as she thought about the conversation in the car with her sister. The question Alexis had asked repeated over again in her head. Do you think we’ll ever see dad again?

  Emery watched as
Rhea’s parents left the room with Alexis, immediately feeling more comfortable in a one-on-one situation. She surveyed the room, her displeasure diminishing more and more by the minute. Their room actually looked like it had been remodeled and repainted—a huge improvement from what she’d just witnessed downstairs in the lobby.

  “What a day,” Emery sighed, digging in her purse for the gift her mom had given her. Now where to put this? She walked over to the closet, noticing a pink silk pouch sitting in the back corner. Perfect. She picked up the pouch and dropped the tin box into it, then tucked it far back into one of the built-in drawers.

  “What’s that?” Rhea asked as Emery shut the closet door behind her.

  She shrugged. “Just a gift my mom gave me. It’s kind of weird, actually. My family never gives gifts. And it’s even weirder that I already miss her.”

  Great, now I’m rambling.

  “I know exactly how you feel.” Rhea turned to her desk to look at a photo of her family. “It’ll be weird not having my parents here. But I have you now.” She smiled and turned back to a partially unpacked box of jewelry, make-up, and shoes.

  Emery raised an eyebrow. What exactly does she mean by that? Before she could ask, Rhea’s phone rang. “Be right back,” Rhea mouthed as she walked out of the room to take the call.

  The bins sat in the middle of the room, begging to be unpacked. Guess I should get started on that. As Emery began to organize her shoes, her phone buzzed with a flight reminder. It’s time for Alexis to leave already? It seemed like they’d only just arrived. A wave of sadness washed over her. Even though her sister drove her crazy at times, Emery was going to miss her. She pulled her keys from her pocket, then strode out the door, signaling to Rhea that she had to run a quick errand.