I received a few emails in reply, but not nearly as many as I’d hoped. Most of them expressed how little they thought of me, curiosity as to how I’d got DeepBlue’s name (Because I couldn’t really be his nephew, oh no) and, finally, one serious email. It was, coincidentally, from one of my uncle’s ‘associates’ I mentioned in the last record, proton. It’s spelled with a lowercase ‘p’, from what I know. Of course, he might just not have proper grammar, or he might not even be English. I don’t even know if this proton is a he, after all. I don’t know anything about him – I just hope he can do what he says.
The contents of the email were as follows:
“BlueAdept,
Yes I knew your uncle, and he was a great man. He got me through some very tough times, and he always spoke fondly of you. And while I have immense respect for your uncle, and his opinions of you, you don’t know what you’re getting yourself into here. Do you know how many people have access to Level 5 Internet? Single digits. And to prove I’m serious, here are your bank details, addresses, phone numbers… You should take more care with your anonymity son.
1 Attachment of 2: AdeptBlue.rar
However… I know you’ve spoken to some of the others… And I know for a fact that they’ll turn you down and make you suffer. So here’s what I’ll do. I’ll make sure the others don’t harm you. Your details will never be made public, you’re under my protection now. And I will give you this.
2 Attachment of 2: Corer.csn
The CSN in the file name stands for Closed Shell Network. It’s the most secure thing in the computing world. Everything is there, from Government censuses to the Kill Switch for the 13 Root DNS servers. For that reason, it’s complicated to open. I recommend doing so in a virtual machine running Tails Linux, because Windows cannot handle this sort of thing. As much as I liked your uncle, he made life hard for the black hats after he left us. If you open it in your Windows OS, your fan will shut down, and your CPU and RAM will overheat exponentially, until your system actually catches fire. He didn’t really like the idea of people being able to open the Corer, so he took matters into his own hands.
Anyway, you’ll have to open it through the Linux Terminal, and you’ll get a code entered into your text box. It’ll probably have around an exabyte of data in plain text, which gives you an idea of the length of the thing. Enter that code into your Linux standard edition of Chromium, and wait. It’ll prompt you with a load of questions. Just answer honestly. I trust you because Blue did. Don’t let me, or him, down. Please.
proton”
Well, I don’t really have any Linux operating systems. I wouldn’t, would I? This is my uncle’s laptop, and he did work for Windows. He always had the latest updates before most other people. It’s just a benefit of the job, I guess.
But what’s this?
At the bottom of the document that contained the list of names, I found a single line of text. I don’t know how I managed to miss it before.
As on the paper my uncle had left me, it was a file pathname.
C:\Users\user\Downloads\Linux
It seemed too easy, just to be given everything.
It was.
I typed it in and found a folder named Linux.
Inside were three files. One was what I assumed to be Linux, one was an image and the other was a text file. Opening the text file, I found instructions.
‘I hope you manage to read this, Ryan. If you do, then I can be sure that you are investigating. This may aid you.
To use Linux, try extracting all the files and placing the finished product on a USB. You can boot it from BIOS.
The image contains a program called BackTrack. It’s made by Linux, and it may come in useful later. To use it, burn the image to a CD. Again, you’ll need to boot it from BIOS.
Good luck.’
BIOS is that thing when you start a computer, when writing comes up with something like ‘F12 – BIOS options’ or F12 – Boot menu’ or something similar. It’s what checks for an operating system, such as Windows, and starts it. No BIOS, not computer.
How is it possible that my uncle could have foreseen all this?
I have no idea, but I’m very glad he did.
According to this ‘proton’, I’ll need Linux to be able to run the program he’s sent me. If that can allow me entry to Mariana’s Web, I’ll be surprised.
…but will I?
So much has happened in such a short space of time.
I’m not sure what’s possible anymore.
Isn’t the web virtual anyway?
Anything is possible.
So my next step is to completely install Linux – and do a full backup of all the files on my computer. I wouldn’t want to lose any of it if anything goes wrong, and from what proton says about the program’s capabilities when run on Windows, it’s a chance I’m not going to take if I’m not fully convinced it’s safe.
Then I’ll have to work out how to run this ‘virtual machine’ on Linux, as proton stated in the email.
This could take a good couple of days if my laptop is slow, and then I’m going to want to check it all before I run that program.
Proton, who are you? I mean, I know you’re one of my uncle’s old friends, but who are you now? Why are you helping me like this when none of the others will?
It might be seen as rude if I ask him or her that, so for now I’ll have to be content with my own thoughts and guesswork.
Good luck to myself. I’m going to need it.
