Fatal Attraction Ch. 01

Hey everybody! I'm back! thanks to all those fans who've been waiting for a story for me. I mean I made ya'll wait one whole year, but I'm on my summer vacation again and I just had to pen dow this story!

It's a lot different from 'Black and White' but I hope you'll enjoy it immensely!

and don't forget to mail any feedback to me.

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The shootout at ‘Crazy Mongers' would be one to remember. Sadly there were just a handful of people who would even hear of it. Nevertheless, the skirmish that ensued at the bar, and the god-like skill that was unleashed would be etched as the last image into the brains of all those that had taken a bullet before they fell to the floor.

Christian stared at his mate in wonder and shock. It was still to dark to see but he could make out Duke's slumped kneeling posture as the latter breathed heavily. He was clutching his prized gun in his palms tightly. The gun that had just taken more than a dozen lives.

Christian scrambled to his feet as he slowly crept up to Duke and reassuringly put his hands on his companion's shoulders.

"You ok buddy?" He asked in a gentle voice.

Duke lifted his face slowly, finally peeling his eyes away from the semi-automatic pistol in his hand.

"Yeah, I think so."

Then Christian whistled in a low voice before he added, "What the hell was that Badgerking? Are you some kind of a monster or something?"

Duke did not reply.

The almost supernatural sleight of gun that Duke had just displayed would brand him a legend forever. Sadly there were not many who had witnessed the scene or would ever know about it.

Episode 1

Duke yawned blatantly and scratched his collarbone as he waited for the chat applet to load. The past few weeks had seen him with no assignments and no hack requests. No small jobs and no password cracking tasks or trapdoor entry requests. Hell, he was bored with life. And the money was not coming one way or another.

The screen flashed as the applet loaded and Duke signed in as BadgerKing. A chat room where mere mortal net surfers would never dare lurk. For there was every possibility of an IP hack, a Trojan load off, or many other things would be done to one's computer just for entering the ‘dark side of the net' like this. To be here, one had to be adept at using the computer and know way more than the average internet surfer; armed with his knowledge of the browser and his list of a few web-sites that he frequents. But then again, simpleton net users would hardly ever surface in a hacker's haven like this.

Ordinary firewalls were a hacker's delight. They loved proving to users that the software which they used to protect themselves was less than competent, and the methods they adopted to prove their points were not exactly lukewarm welcomes.

Duke picked up his standard thermocol glass that read "Café Coffee Day" and sipped at the iced tea as he glanced at the topics being discussed. His feet were tapping on the floor as the headphones around his neck continued to thump music into his ears. Duke was a heavy metal listener, classified by most people as noise and Duke was a lover of the extreme side of it; death metal; which as its genre name suggested, was exactly the type of music that would have been played if human sacrifices were being made by a horde of savages.

Suddenly a personal message window popped up with a message for Duke.

"Are you THE BadgerKing?"

7 months ago, an A-class hacker had assumed the alias BadgerKing and had put the FBI to shame. This ace hacker had broken into the FBI secure system infringing through their stronghold servers, peeling of all their firewalls and assumed control for a total of 1 hour and 23 minutes. Understandably, any FBI personnel who logged in within that time period were astonished to find the wallpaper of a pesky rodent; the badger, and the photos in the lists of the top 10 most wanted criminals in the world had been replaced by other members of the rodent family.

Dignity had never been restored to the FBI for that incident for they could never catch the perpetrator. Hell, they could not even certify which part of the world he was from. The name BadgerKing stuck on after that, the King who had skimmed into their tightest security, right under their noses, taken over the reins of their kingdom, mocked the entire department and then slid back out without leaving any clue for them. The case was supposedly under wraps but of course the entire internet underworld knew of it.

The FBI was still hot on the heels of this enigmatic hacker. Not so much to catch hold and punish him but more to recruit him. But they had no leads in any direction whatsoever.

"Yeah I am." Duke typed back. He had gotten used to answering that question.

Ever since the FBI break-in 7 months back, the alias BadgerKing had become a rage amongst hackers and crackers alike. It was not uncommon in those days to encounter several different people who assumed that nickname or some varied version of it. BadgerKing69, BadgerKingXXX, bAdgerkIng:) and even a series of BadgerQueens. Those nicks were dwindling these days, the incident slowly fading out of people's memories as new and more daring hack attempts took the spotlight.

The 22 year old junkie, Duke had been the original BadgerKing.

And he knew that stating that he was indeed the ‘real' BadgerKing to some weirdo on the net meant nothing. Most who assumed the nickname anyway claimed that they were indeed the original BadgerKing.

Duke sighed as he closed the small pop up that was the personal message window. He thought back to how times 7 months ago, had been the heydays. The days when he had felt that nothing in the digital world was outside his reach. He was after all a self-proclaimed king. And though he had done the FBI stint for fun, accepting it as a challenge, it had still been his masterpiece. One he never thought he could top. And no one even knew he had done it. Not a soul. Nor had he gotten any sort of monetary gain from it. Yet he had spent all of 4 weeks to break into the system, baffling tracers, shattering firewalls and breaking through all those impossible algorithms. All to satisfy his ever parched thirst for adrenaline.

But now was a different time, when challenges were many and the horizon seemed endless. Nothing seemed to excite him these days. And nothing good was coming along. He still did a few trick jobs for clients online. A password here and backdoor entry there, but those mundane tasks were beginning to bore him. He was glad he still had the company of Colt and his bike, the two loves in his life.

Duke scratched under his left ear and glanced down at the dirty t-shirt he was wearing. The damn thing was twice his size and he had been wearing it since the last four days. It was reeking by now..

"Well, I guess I should change my shirt." Duke voiced to his own self as the funny odor from the shirt made its way up to his nostrils.

Just as he was about to close the chat window and raise himself from the dingy corner that was his computer centre, another personal message popped up.

"R u sure that ur the real BadgerKing?"

Duke sighed as he looked to the nickname this time; Fiery_babe.

"I'm positive," Duke typed and sighed again as he hit the enter key. Was this heading anywhere anyway?

The screen remained blank as Duke waited for Fiery_babe's reply. None seemed to come however for the next 20 seconds or so and Duke was just about to close the window again. That's when those words flashed on his screen.

"Then lets c u get thru this."

Immediately Duke blanched as his screen turned blue and a green blinking block cursor was the only thing left on the top left corner of his screen. That and a timer running on the right corner counting down 15 minutes. ‘Time left for DOOMSVILLE', the words beneath the timer read.

Duke stared in shock. What the hell had just happened?! And then he frantically tried moving his mouse around to no effect. The green cursor continued to blink and then someone typed the letters from across; "It's a challenge then!"

Duke was still dazed. How could this be happening? Was someone that skilled and that adept with their breakthrough skills that they had just shattered his firewalls and blocking programs just like that? That was hardly possible, for most of the programs he used were designed himself. And he was way beyond the amateur hacker for some prank of this sort to be working on him. But still the screen in front of him suggested otherwise.

As bewildered thoughts ran through Duke's mind, a program applet opened up at the centre of the screen and algorithmic codes starting inundating his screen. Duke stared in a dazed manner at all the various applets loading one after the other, the code stack, the function declarations, the function bodies and what looked like loads of cryptographic nonsense to Duke.

"If this is a hoax", Duke thought to himself, "Its way too elaborate!"

He rubbed his chin and clicked his tongue. "Ok, let's try it out!" he exclaimed to the empty room and frantically started hitting the keys.

A half minute of frantic trying later, Duke realized that it was no use trying to escape the program. He was in some sort of an infinite loop and had to break the loop by cracking the code in all the window applets. He could not forcefully exit the program nor use any of his pre-programmed cracking utilities and software to assist. And the timer was ticking down. Duke was not sure what would happen at the end of the stipulated period but he was sure he did not want to find out. After all, a hacker with the capability to design such a malicious code could do any damn thing he wanted with his system.

Or he could just pull the main power cord before the time ran out, Duke reasoned with himself.

And with that he rubbed his hands before he frantically started trying to figure out how to get out of this morass the hard way.

A few minutes later, Duke's face was red. The coding was real good. In fact it was of a type he had never encountered before. Combining Nth order matrices with basic C language and looping techniques, the ingenious code was way beyond anything he had ever seen before. It seemed to be the perfect firewall and at the same time a malicious one. And sweating as he was by now, Duke had no clue of how he was going to crack it at all. He realized that this was some sort of an ‘open code' extension, designed by a particular user who alone must be knowing the way through its confusing labyrinths.

He looked at the timer. It said 8 minutes and 14 seconds left. And then he glanced at the power cord of his computer, jutting out from behind the mahogany desk. It seemed to be the only option now.

Just then his eyes fell on the first words written on the screen in green letters.

"It's a challenge then!"

And that made his stomach churn. Here was the great BadgerKing reduced to shambles by some amateur hacker. Someone who broke through all his systems protection in a jiffy and who was now gleefully challenging him. And Duke was helpless. Had he been reduced to this?

Duke took a deep breath, took a long sip of iced tea from his thermocol glass and wiped the sweat of his brow before he returned to the keyboard and the screen. There was no way he was going to give up here. This code was not going to get the better of him. He was absolutely not going to pull that power cord no matter what the circumstances.

His fingers hit the keys at a lightning rate as his mind leafed through all the jumbled mazes, his mind performing a zillion calculations a minute. Fitting in the row matrix vectors was absolute genius, he reckoned, for they stupefied him to the extent where he almost wanted to break down and cry at the thought of deciphering them. But if the code was so damn perfect then why had he never encountered such a type before? His mind reeled as it whisked through thousands of permutations and combinations that would be required to break the various deadlocks.

Or maybe it's not that perfect after all. He suddenly realized. And with that thought his brainstorming stormed onto a new level. A level beyond those of mere mortals. And it peaked and reached his culmination as Duke suddenly realized the sheer trickery of the code.

A few calmly typed keys later, Duke whistled triumphantly as he pressed the final return key and launched himself out of the Death window. He exclaimed a loud ‘Yes!' to the empty room and patted his own back. He had done it! And he still had a minute and 8 seconds left!

And then he glanced at the screen again as a message pooped up from the person who had just send him on a ride to hell and back.

"That was good!"

In his befuddled state, before Duke could think of what to write back, whether to choke this person and kill him or congratulate him or her, another message appeared on the screen.

"Catch you later then!"

And the mysterious chatter logged off.

Duke spent the next 20 minutes trying to trace the hacker. But it was all in vain. He found no trace to go ahead on and just hoped that he would bump into Fiery_babe sooner or later. Little did Duke know that it would be more sooner than later

~~~

Duke had had only two loves in his life. The first was 92 inches in length and 39 inches in width. Weighing over 550 lbs, his lover was hardly animate. That's until Duke rode it. His lover was a BMW K 1200 GT, a Deep blue metallic Sports touring bike. The bike had cost him a bomb given his lousy monetary habits, it had taken him several months of saving to purchase.

Duke approached the devilish creature in the narrow garage his building owned, striding towards it purposefully dressed in black leather pants and a black Ducati jacket to match. One glance at him would scream out Bike-freak to anyone, but Duke hardly cared. Once he was on his crotch-rocket, it would be off pointed to the horizon, chugging in mile after mile or more or less lead him to one of the only destinations he would visit everyday; the Archery.

Duke mounted the bike and settled into the tipped-forward position as he slipped on his helmet. Seconds later the powerful 4-cylinder 152 bhp cylinder roared to life as Duke zoomed away.

The Archery was a shooting range. Where beginners and experts alike practiced their shooting skills, for sport or for other purposes. It was a 20 minute drive from Duke's beat-down apartment. Duke never took more than 10 minutes to reach it.

The Archery was where Duke would brandish the second love of his life. ‘Colt' as duke referred to her. She weighed hardly a kilogram and was barely 4 inches in length. A semi-automatic single action pistol, the Colt M1911 was Duke's prized possession. And he unleashed its lethality every single evening at the Archery, and he believed he had gotten pretty good at it.

Armed with his two lovers, Duke sped off for one of the only destinations that caused him to leave his crumby apartment. The other destination would be wherever Damien forced him to go. It had been a couple of days since Damien last met him. Duke knew it was about time that Damien got restless about his friend's social life and would soon be beckoning him to ‘get out of the damned house and mingle with the singletons or to at least get laid!'

~~~

Damien was getting impatient waiting at the bar. He had been waiting far too long for Duke to arrive. There were way too many hot guys around and if Duke did not make it in time, then they would be missing out on quite a few of them. ‘That's only if Duke's interested', he thought to himself.

Lately Damien had been growing aware of Duke's reclusion. The lad wasn't one to have a very active social life from the very beginning. Duke's idea of a social life was probably his bike, his gun and his computer, but nowadays Duke had virtually turned into a hermit.

Just then Damien noticed a tall biker-jacket clad guy entering the bar from the other end. Yup, Duke had arrived.

Crazy Mongers was a gay bar. A place where neither the atmosphere was too smoky nor the music too loud. Duke would never step into a place where techno and trance thumped at your skull or where smoke and dazzling lights made you feel like you were high without smoking any pot. Of course that meant that all the fun places that Damien liked to hang out at were not an option if he wanted Duke along but he would have to make some sacrifices for his sloppy best friend.

"So how's our darling hacker anchorite today?" Damien squealed out as Duke made his way towards him and took a place by the bar stools at the counter.

Duke flipped him off with a finger before flopping atop the high stool and letting a whoosh of air out. Damien snorted as he noticed Duke scratching his head with his right hand and unzipping the black leather jacket with the other. And then he had to stop himself from bursting out in laughter.

"What?" Duke asked as he noticed Damien staring at his jacket.

"You still wear those crummy t-shirts don't you? I mean have absolutely no sense of fashion."

"I don't give a rat's ass about fashion."

"Oh yeah, then what about common dressing sense and hygiene? I mean you come in all dressed up like some leather stud in what looks like a 600$ jacket and then you take it off to reveal a 2 dollar t-shirt. I mean look at that thing, it probably has stains on it since last year. I don't wanna be seen with you in that thing."

Duke just nodded his head dismissively as he shrugged Damien off. He knew he was a bit anti-social, but he really did not need a lecture on what not to wear on public from Damien right now. Damien got the hint and shifted to his favorite line of conversation.

"Anyways you know what? I finally did the dirty with Sam today."

"Sam?" Duke asked with a questioning look on his face.

"Yeah Sam, you moron, that redheaded hottie from my office", Damien replied in a nasal voice irritated that Duke had forgotten already. "I'd been stalking him for ages."

He knew that Damien stalking someone for ages meant that it was just his most recent infatuation that lasted half a day before he would finally screw the guy and move on to the next conquest.

Duke snorted slightly as he motioned the bartender to come over and take their order. Duke was a total teetotaler, never one to quaff alcohol, but he needed something to distract him as he listened to Damien and would order a coke for himself. He was a little peeved at the fact that the bar did not serve iced-tea.

"Oh Him!" Duke exclaimed, pretending he knew exactly who Damien was referring to. He actually had no clue.

"Yeah, and you won't believe it, we did the horizontal mamba in the men's room at the office!"

Duke hardly raised an eye-brow. He would have to let Damien continue with the story of his latest escapades for now.

"So we were both in the men's room. Actually I kinda followed him in. And well we made eye contact in the mirror before he dragged me inside a cubicle and slammed me against the wall."

Duke was barely listening. He was instead thinking about what he would have to eat once he got back home.

"And then it was frantic man, all the clothes being tugged at before all the family jewels came out and you won't believe it, but when I zeroed in on his mouth, he said he didn't like to kiss!"

"Yeah?" Duke asked barely listening.

"Yeah man, that's when I swooped down on his face and smothered his lips with my own and man, kiss he did! He freaking ate me as if his life depended on it!"

"Uh huh…"

"And you should've…" Damien suddenly stopped as he noticed the bored expression on his companions face.

"You're not even listening to what I'm saying", Damien shrieked causing a few patrons of the bar to look towards them. "For Christ's sake, it was the fuck of the century and you don't wanna listen?"