Lily didn't like being put to the side, and thats what this felt like. It felt like Angelo was asking for trust, but that he wasn't giving it to her. "No. Not including me, not letting me help, that just shows that you don't trust me. That you think I am...worthless. I won't stand for that, Angelo. I may still be new to accel world, but damn it, I"m not a child, so don't treat me like one!"

you know that's not true" Angelo said calmly looking at her "Its because I think your worth the most to me that im keeping you safe. you are my protégé and not only that you someone who I trust and I want to protect you. Im simply not telling you because theirs nothing you can do to help me in this situation im not sweeping you away, im not ignoring you, and I will never think you are worthless." Angelo said softly knowing he never said anything like this to anybody. He hasn't wanted to protect anyone since before he got attacked but then it really means that Angelo is starting to get over it, even if he is only trying to protect the person he is practically raising to be an amazing burst linker one day...

"I could be more help then you think" Lily said softly, shaking her head. "Lets just get on with the damn lesson" She was sure they wouldn't be logging on today, so she didn't get her link out. Lily knew she could help, knew she could do stuff. She wasn't useless, and if they just let her in, she could help, damn it!

She sighed, and sat down, weary. She tugged her lunch out her bag, and settled down to eat it, looking down at it.

im sorry lily just not this time" Angelo told her as he sat down against the fence eating his own lunch before he started his lesson, they wouldn't link for this so he would just tell her "Today the lesson will be about going against the traditional fighting sense" Angelo said hoping she would get the tip. Angelo said she couldn't help in this situation but if she could show the initative to come after him when he leaves he wont necessarily punish her for it. However after that statement he went back to talk about different ways to fight in a battle...

The rest of the school day was uneventful for Kris. As the debate team captain he'd finished outlining the arguments for cross examination on the upcoming tournament and gave research assignments to his other teammates. Then he went back to class and waited for the final bell to let school out.

Kris weaved his way through the rushing masses of students eagerly in pursuit of their after school endeavors, and slipped out a side entrance to exit the school network's range quicker. He opened up his private email to find one unread message from Ochre Technic:

To: Aurrorian
BCC: Jangel
From: Ochre Technic

hey duds,

i luked up like dat haxer man u told me about, da news be spreadin too, last time he got in a fite wuz round my place homie. i traced his bot ip, turns out they be pingin from a server round daly city, lukin up on gps tell me prob from dat city's private hi school. now i dunno if student neuro linkers be haxed (cuz dat sum serius shit rite there), or mebbe sum ol infected computer gotta bot program installed, so dat will be up 2 u 2 find out. k im out till u got more q's, peace homies.

ps sry man so stoned rite now, cant type strait 420blazinit

Kris went back inside school to meet up with Psycholangelo in the tutor program and discuss their course of action. He was silently thankful for Ochre's vital information, but he couldn't help but keep a hand over his face the whole walk back.

Lily just sighed and listened to what Angelo had to say. After a while she set her lunch aside and wrapped her arms around her knees, only moving once more to head back to classes. She brooded throughout the day, still annoyed and angry. But mostly hurt. She only wanted to help. So it was that by the end of the day, she wasn't even too sure what she had learned.

Sighing, she packed up her things reluctNtly

Just as they discussed Angelo was waiting on front of their meeting place so they could get the information and he had his tazer on him just in case, right now he wished that lily understood his reasoning and not hate him for it. Angelo waited on Kris to show up with whatever news he got from his contact...

Kris came across Psycho already in front of the tutor program's entrance, and proceeded to nod and smile as he opened the door for him. "Come on in, I suppose we could get in some help with your Lit class before the 'party'."

At the furthest back table, he stretched out his hand for the Link Cable and attached it. Now in private, Kris's expression turned cold, and thought-spoke, "I've received an email from my contact, and I assume you have too since I handed you his address. If you need it, I can send you a VPN program to cover yourself in the school network while you check your private email."

no need im a fast reader' Angelo thought to him as he opened his private messages and quickly looked through it before he tossed it into the delete pile along with anything else that may have been attached to it as he looked at kris 'so we either have someone with a bot program installed or someone got a virus that is causing it. im temped to think the later cause a virus will be harder to deal with if it got into any major network. By the way you have stoner for a contact?' Angelo asked him since it was really just a what the hell to Angelo that this is serious and Kris's so called contact was stoned when writing the message, that doesn't exactly instill confidence in Angelo that the information is completely solid but for the time being he will trust Kris...

Lily refused to be pushed aside. She was a part of this, and damn it, that meant taking part in the danger. She knew if either Angelo or Kristopher saw her, they'd manhandle her back. There was no way she was going to let that happen. So she'd just have to sneak about. Certainly she had done that enough with her Aunt, so these two should be a piece of cake. She found Angelo easily enough, and waited to see what would happen. She knew when they went in that she wouldn't be able to get closer without arousing suspicion. So she waited, waited for them to come back out

"Well...he's given solid information before, and while cold, so I'm trusting there's been little change in his validity." Kris rested his shoulders on the table, interlocked his fingers, and pondered Psycho's hypothesis. "I agree with your reasoning, it is far fetched that students' Neuro Linkers have malware installed on them, and only the school has the authority to indirectly install programs for us within their network. However, we must now address the issue of which other computers (or related electronics) within the school have been converted into bots."

He unlocked his fingers and held up one for each point, "The library has Google computers for student use, also a main server to store all e-books and media for borrow; the technology lab has a course where retro PCs and Macs are used in the curriculum, plus the geeky teacher is known to hoard more antique tech; and most students know that secretaries within the main office use a computer as a student database to keep attendance and whatever, principals notwithstanding."

"And then there's related electronics. Tablets are used by multiple staff including teachers, and even here in the tutor program for us to physically interface with students. The surface tables used in physical education, you know the ones where the field changes for whatever activity like table tennis or air hockey, those can be converted into bots. Anything with the sufficient hardware and software requirements really can support an emulator for Brain Burst, however bad the AI is programmed to be." His hands held up eight fingers.

Leaves to many variables to fully check up on. we can rule out the old fashioned electronics like the pc's and mac's, if you were using a bot program you wouldn't want it to be stationary for anyone to take unless it was your own private computer. In this situation I think it would be a person with an old school tablet in their inventory. allowing them to keep it mobile and on their person so the only way they would be caught is if someone actually stole it from them." Angelo thought to him through the cable and he soon sighed and he just called out regularly "lily if you feel the need to drop in then try not to sneak up otherwise I would have mistaken you for our hacker" Angelo called out knowing someone was their and the main reason he didn't think it was someone else was because he remembered lily's perfume. Right now Angelo was thinking that she could help narrow their search down at this point...

Lily was pleased with herself, listening in right up until Angelo called out to her. She cursed under her breath, wondering how he knew she was there. She thought she was doing so well, and she hadn't made any noise. So how did he know? Kristopher clearly didn't know that she had been there, or he wouldn't have told Angelo as much as he had.

Sighing, she stepped out from where she was, refusing to look ashamed, she held her head up high, planting her hands on her hips and staring at both of them silent. What could she say? She wasn't going to apologize to them. She didn't think she needed to. Finally though she said "why can't we simply track the ID that hacked us? If they did t once, they'd do it again. Why can't you follow the trail from there? There had to be some control over those NPCs, so...you could follow the signal right?"

As Lily walked over, Kris relaxed his shoulders and leaned back, an amused smile dancing on his lips. In real life he spoke, "Why hello there, Ms. King, nice of you to join your boyfriend for a tutor session. Psy - excuse me, Angelo just needed some help with Literature before a...festive appointment this afternoon. I don't believe women were invited, unfortunately."

He listened to her direct proposal, and slightly expected/surprised she knew by coincidence/deduction what the private conversation was about. Not breaking stride, he slowly put a finger to his lips and replied, "Hey now, education isn't the proper setting to talk about trivial matters like video games, especially when I'm the tutor. Maybe later online, when we can have a heart to heart on other matters, if you want."

He winked at her with his right eye, and glanced out of the other at Psycho, waiting for his response.

"Interesting that you'd jump to the conclusion that Angelo and I are together. Are you Jealous Kristopher?" Lily said easily, flopping down into a chair, finding the fact that they were using a electronic communication when after all, their links had been hacked not even 24 hours ago. But she wasn't going to say anything else about that. "Ah, but maybe you're jealous because you like Angelo, seeing as you're going to a "guys festival:", but then, I don't judge"

She chuckled lightly to herself, amused at her quick responses, leaning back into the chair, and looking to Angelo.

Angelo sighed a little as kris and lily went about their dance of hostility and he waited till they were both done before responding although he did think that lily was clever with the guy festival thing he soon took of his neural cable and turned to lily "cause any hacker worth their salt wouldn't be traces that way. after today ill explain everything to you but for now we wont talk about games. Now if later you want to talk about games we can do that privately, for now me and kris will need to go to our "party" and by the end we will have more time and info to work with for our games. Its a gamming party so we will have more information for our gamming project don't worry" Angelo said making it seem as normal as he could...

Kris coughed in surprise, as he realized even Psycho was willing to ditch his Protoge even momentarily and leave her vulnerable against the hacker; Kris couldn't complain though since Lily was somewhat of an extra liability on his already stretched sanity levels. Still despite the both of them recognizing the weak link in their chain, he felt a bit guilty to leave her out of the loop for...how long will it even take to flush out this hacker with just a team of two? His mind whirled through the options: join us, leave her, or...a third even? Inwardly sighing, he concluded, We can't leave her alone, and it's not like she'll leave us be...sometimes I hate being the manipulative one.

Kris spoke out loud again, this time in a tone shaped of daggers, and a matching icy glare, "Look, I'll repeat what I said yesterday again. If you're unwilling to learn, you'll only be a hindrance to yourself and get in the way of others. Walking into the tutor center without an appointment, just to mess with students will get you kicked out. And as I'm busy right now with Angelo, either find another tutor to help you, or leave."

Lily was tired of being manipulated, tired of being left behind, tired of not being involved, and most of all tired of their attitude. She simply stared, almost challengingly, at Kristopher. "Then kick me out" she replied in an almost bored tone, "because I'm not leaving. I'm not sitting in my empty apartment, wondering what the hell is happening, scared to even touch the damn link. I'm not doing it. Throw me out, do it, but I'll just follow again anyway. Are you willing to risk that?" She demanded, she stared at both of them, not caring if anyone over heard right then. So what? She was through being scared about that. If someone was going to listen, they would find a way, even if they did it through links, which had already proven to be suseptable to hacking.

Angelo sighed loudly rubbing his eyes in frustration if their was one thing Angelo forgot is that his protégé was stubborn as hell. He forced a linker cord into her neural linker and took out the one with kris so he could talk privately with his protégé told her in her mind 'stop acting like a child, all im doing is getting information tonight. This is not the end of the world the only reason im standing with kris is because his contact told us something useful and that was what we were discussing before you barged in. If you want to help fine but don't force your way into something where you cant help.' Angelo thought to her making sure to mask his anger on the outside that she just wont listen when he told her that their wasn't anything she could do to help AT THE TIME! not never not that she cant he said she couldn't help at the time.

Kris sighed outwardly this time, as he watched the expressions change of Angelo and Lily's furious, silent exchange, and steeled himself in case things decided to backfire. He rose to his feet and called out to the head tutor, "Excuse me, could you help this student, Lily, out? I think she wants a tutor for her calculus, but I'm busy right now. Maybe someone else could take her in?"

//

The head tutor leaned out over his desk and replied, "Sure!" He set down the magazine he was reading and got out of his seat to greet Lily, waving to get her attention, "Hello, if you don't mind me interrupting your private conversation, would you like a tutor for anything?"