"Video?!" gasped Naoko, looking pale.
"Yep, this software turns your phone into a spy camera. Whoever controls it can see and hear everything."
Naoko bent over and dry-heaved. Parallel self bodies didn’t need food, so her stomach was empty, but that didn’t stop it from trying to turn itself inside out.
Jack put his hand on Naoko’s back and gently rubbed it.
There was nothing he could say to reassure her. Her father had invaded her privacy in a way that was beyond reprehensible.
He’d been planning to tell her to act like nothing had changed until after he could get the trust fund established, but that was not an option now.
"Should I not have..." started Madison.
"No, she needed to know," he said. "It’s just hard to process something ."
After a few minutes, Naoko straightened up, then turned and hugged him.
"Dominatrix?" he asked.
"I recorded it on my phone," she wailed.
"Never record..." started Madison.
"Madison!" he said sternly. "Now is not the time for a security lesson."
"No, I want to hear," said Naoko.
He sighed, then said in a monotone voice, "Never record something on your phone unless you are comfortable uploading it to WebTube." ᴛʜɪs ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ ɪs ᴜᴘᴅᴀᴛᴇ ʙʏ novel(ꜰ)ire.net
Naoko sighed. "If you had told me that yesterday, I’d have thought that was ridiculously paranoid."
"I mean, it is a little paranoid," he said. "Madison scans her phone regularly, but still refuses to take any pictures or video with her phone. Not even nature scenes, because they could reveal her location."
"It’s not paranoia if they really are out to get you," muttered Madison.
"If we’re gonna release high tech VR hardware, you might as well design a smartphone that’s actually hack-proof. Though I’m not sure how you’d do that if even multi-trillion dollar companies like AntHill can’t manage it."
"With the amount of compute power I’ll have once I get that simulation designed, I could brute-force it. Companies use fuzz testing to try and find vulnerabilities, but they cannot try every combination of input. It’s too expensive. But I bet I can."
"What do you recommend we do about Naoko’s phone?" he asked. "Can you hack the spyware and control what it sends?"
"Why bother. Just lose the phone. Drop in a storm drain or something."
"Can you brick it remotely?" asked Naoko.
"Or that," said Madison. Then she looked at Jack and said, "Link it?"
He enabled linked template for the Naoko’s phone, then nodded to Madison.
She typed on a keyboard for a few moments, then sat back and watched something. A minute later she said, "Okay. Done. Once you export the changes, her phone will be nothing but an expensive paperweight."
"Do you have anything on your phone you cannot afford to lose?" he asked Naoko.
"No. I don’t have an eidetic memory, but it’s close. So, anything really important I have memorized."
"I hate you," muttered Madison. She was jealous of Naoko’s near-eidetic memory. But then, so was he.
"Just say the word and your phone will be de-creepified."
He pushed the changes.
Naoko stared off into space for a second, then said, "Yup, dead."
"If you have cash, go buy one of those super cheap flip phones they sell at convenience stores. Then, call your phone company and have them port your phone number to it. Make sure it’s really a dumb phone; nothing but a cheap LCD display, no smartphone features."
"Is that so they can’t install spyware on it?" asked Naoko.
"Yep. Only cellphone companies can track dumb phones."
"Also, if you don’t want to go back home, I can slip you some cash and you can go stay at the Grand Wallingford."
"Hmm. First, my phone mysteriously dies. Then I suddenly just happen to acquire a bag of cash and go stay at the best hotel in the state. My father will think one of his rivals is making a play. I like it. Just tell me where to go to pick up the cash."
Jack grinned. "Who said you had to go pick it up? I said I’d slip it to you."
He had a few bundles of hundred-credit bills back in his hotel room safe. Not because he needed that much cash, but because it felt baller to have a couple hundred grand in cash ’just lying around’.
He located, templatized, then linked Naoko’s school backpack.
When it appeared, she asked, "Um, what are you doing with my backpack?"
"Just watch," he said with a grin.
He linked and templatized two 100-bill "straps" of 100 credit bills. Then he synced the cash and Naoko’s backpack templates.
Once synced, he opened her backpack, stuffed the two bundles into her pack, then zipped it closed.
"Abracadabra," he said with a flourish, then clapped his hands as he exported the changes.
"What was that?" asked Naoko.
"Check your backpack," he said.
She reached for the one sitting on the floor in Madison’s office.
He deleted it, then said, "Not that one, your real backpack."
She frowned at him, then opened her mouth in surprise.
"Holy shit! How’d you do that?!"
He relented and explained about the teleportation "magic" he could perform using linked and synched templates.
"What about teleporting people?" she asked.
"Doesn’t work, because I can’t sync linked self with a linked template."
"Okay, but what happens if you teleport a container that has something inside that wasn’t linked?"
Why didn’t I think of that?! It was becoming his catchphrase, but this time, he didn’t say it out loud.
He could teleport one object inside another if the two templates were linked and synced, like he’d just done with the cash and Naoko’s backpack, or fake spiny tongue and Rose’s panties, or Derik’s shoe insole and the thumbtack.
But what happened if the object he teleported was a container and it had something inside that wasn’t linked? Would that object get left behind, or would it get teleported with the container? And if that worked, could he do the same with a person?
He was tempted to leave class and go back to his hotel room so he could test Naoko’s teleportation idea, but decided to see if one of the other girls was near some appropriate containers.
"Nora, Samantha, Naoko, do any of you have immediate access to two containers, where one will fit inside the other? And an object that will fit inside the smaller container?"