The Bit-Hacker
by David Hash Miller
“Hi, excuse me, I’m in 17A, can I scoot by?”. The new autonomous passenger trains were spacious and comfortable, but my seatmate in 17B had a laptop plugged into the USB port on the seatback entertainment screen, its silver braided cable blocking my way. He looked up at me, eyes dark and quick.
“One sec.” He made a few final taps on his keyboard, then unplugged the cable, clearing my path. “All set.”
As I slid by and settled into my seat, I noticed that my entertainment screen - showing a graphical “Welcome to Acela2” intro - was markedly different from his, which displayed rapidly scrolling text. I’m not a technical guy, but I do work for a technology company and have learned a thing or two through osmosis.
“Uh, why is your screen booting Linux?”
He shrugged. “I hacked it. That’s why.”
“How? These trains are secure.”
“Nothing is secure, guv’nor.”
“That is fundamentally untrue. Look, I know. I work for TechBold - I’m in marketing in the election systems division. And I assure you, our systems are very, very secure. We guarantee free and fair elections.”
“Any tech I touch, I can get into. Just may take a little effort.”
“I don’t believe you.”
He looked at me, dark eyes making me uneasy, before turning again toward his laptop and typing a few commands.
“OK, don’t believe me.”
What an ass! Rather than wasting any more of my time with this fool, I instead looked out the window at the speeding landscape and pale sunset.
“Excuse me, Mr. Drayman?” I turned to see a smiling attendant bearing a tray.
“Yes??” I replied, wary.
“Your order, sir! Two beers and two deluxe turkey sandwiches. With extra chips!”, delivered with enthusiasm.
I looked over to my neighbor, who had helpfully opened up both of our seatback trays to accept the proffered food. As the attendant departed, he lifted his beer in a toast to me.
“Thanks for the snack!”
We ate and drank wordlessly. I had many questions, and was about to ask when he began packing up his belongings, typing a few final commands into his laptop before closing it.
“Where are you going?” I asked. “I need to understand -”
“This is my stop” he interrupted, gesturing out the window with a thumb as the train unexpectedly slowed to a smooth stop adjacent to a cornfield.
“Wait—what—what’s your name?” I asked, desperate.
“My friends call me WhiteRat. See you around.”
Moments later, the train smoothly accelerated again, passing through a rural railroad crossing. Before the angle of the window occluded my view, I watched him get into a waiting autonomous Ryde, the small white car automatically opening its door for him. I sat back, chuckling. What a character!
I pulled up my phone to message my wife about this encounter; she’d appreciate it and we’d both get a chuckle out of it. As I did so, a new message notification popped up, from “Transmittor”. Strange...I didn’t remember installing that app. I tapped, and read the message: “Mark, great to meet you. Let’s keep things free and fair! Your new friend, WhiteRat.”
David Hash Miller is an information security professional living and working in New England. After many years of work-related non-fiction writing (including the publication of two technical books), he decided to explore the creative, unstructured, and remarkably adjective-rich world of fiction writing. He can be reached on Twitter @DavidHashMiller.