Another level

– Well, Timofey, have you been making crypto for a long time?
— Are we prohibited from trading crypto?
– No, if its origin is known. But the one whose origin is unknown is prohibited. You are a programmer, you should know this.
– This crypt was left to me by my father. It's a kind of inheritance. You're an investigator, you should know that my father was a programmer all his life.
– Are you being cheeky, Timofey? Do you want a facial massage? We know that your father was a programmer, but he was involved in many dubious projects related to crypto.
– I don't want to, my father just left it to me. You know that I have much more now, he just thought that it shouldn't go to waste. I'm sure you know the amount. You've already cracked the flash drive's protection, haven't you?
— They hacked it, it’s known.
– So what? Take it and enjoy life.

Max already understood what was going on. His programmer dad left his programmer son the password to a wallet with a dozen “shitcoins”. Considering what happened to the crypto, for the son it's just a memory of his father, a kind of digital memory.

– Okay, Jama, I think we should let the patient go. There won't be anything interesting anymore.
– Max, Max, what are you doing?

Max began to fall, fall somewhere into a deep abyss. He flew and flew, and then it was as if someone caught him, like in childhood, in their arms.

– How come, Max, you weren’t scared?
– Who are you?!
– Well, let's start with the fact that I'm Timofey's dad. I already started wrapping you up, but you seemed to have come to your senses? Right about now. But the exit will be painful.
– What are you talking about, what's going on?
– You are a medium, think about what is happening.
– Me? I… how do you know?
— In our world, the other world, everyone knows everything.
– I didn't want to hurt him. I realized that it wasn't our topic, and I was just about to let him go.
– I know. And if you weren't a medium, I wouldn't have pulled you.
— I was just watching my son here without me, and I noticed you.
– And when you were alive…
– No, you know, I was an ordinary programmer.
– Yes, it’s strange. Why now?
– I'll tell you next time, if the interest persists. And now – the exit…

Dzhamshut jumped up and saw that his Max was starting to fall to the floor. But he didn't have time to catch him.
Max Kamarin, a leading investigator in one of the Investigative Committee's divisions, hit his head hard on the corner of a safe when he fell to the floor.
Dzhamshut lifted the boss up and sat him down on a chair, not forgetting to whisper in his ear: “Well, let's finish off the IT guy, I feel like he has a ton of money.”

– No! – Maxim cried out. – Timofey, do you have a photo of your dad, for the record?
– Well, yes, just before his departure… Here he was as cheerful as usual.

Dzhamshut stood up and moved towards Timofey, obviously with his signature speech about how crime had become rampant in Russia and what role Timofey personally played in this.

“Stop,” Maxim raised his clenched fist. It was a signal for Jama: “Shut up.”
“I didn’t understand…” Jama didn’t understand the moment.
“Timofey, here’s your pass, maybe we’ll call you again… probably,” said Max, pushing Timofey out the door.

Dzhamshut sat down at the table and began to sort through papers.

– Max, I don't get it, there's a couple of pieces of green per snout for sure, he's an IT guy…
– Not that case, Jama, not that case. Have you heard anything about Russian sorcerers?
– Boss, haven't had a hangover since yesterday…
– Go to hell…

– Hello, Timofey Leonidovich. Could you tell us in more detail when you last saw your father? Was there anything strange?

Maxim didn't really intend to call Timofey anymore. The voice of “daddy” in his head bothered him so much that he would have gladly forgotten about it. But this morning “Timofey's daddy” “got in touch” again and strongly recommended calling his son. Like, he would share important information with him, and yes, he would have to return the flash drive with the crypto wallet.

– Well, nothing particularly strange. My father wanted to go to our house in Sochi. Well, the only unusual thing was that he called me aside, gave me a flash drive with crypto and told me the password. I also asked, what was this all of a sudden. He answered with a grin that he doesn't trust airplanes now.
– So you didn’t say goodbye to him when he was dying and found out the passwords?
– He didn't intend to die then. I don't understand at all why you decided that he died.
– Well, what about the wallet with credit cards on the shore? The car washed into the sea?
— His body was in the car?
– No, but the doors were wide open. Okay. Today he came to me… I mean, he dreamed me, and told me to give him the flash drive. And the will of the deceased is law. You understand.
– Yes, he told me to take the flash drive.
“Did he come to you too?” Maxim squinted knowingly.
– No, I didn’t really say it, I wrote it in the telegram.
– What! In Telegram, I mean in the messenger?
– Yes, he doesn’t recognize anything except the cart.
– Stop. When did you write it?
– This morning, just before you called.

“This is a turn of events,” Maxim frowned and sank deeper into his chair.

– Was that his account? He died! The phone is not a subscriber, we checked.
— Telegram works even with the number disconnected. Didn't you know? And anyway, even if I believed your version that my father died, I wouldn't be surprised to see a message from him in messengers.
– Why is that?
— Have you ever wondered what the name of the startup he’s working for now is and what its specialty is?
– And? I'm listening carefully.
— “Eternal Memory”. I personally trained the artificial intelligence of chatbots in this project. And everything is ready there. The last thing my father did was agree with investors on the budget for the advertising campaign in Odnoklassniki.
– Damn! So what, he didn't die? Why did you hide this information?
– What was I hiding? I said right away that it was all bullshit.
– I will definitely figure everything out and figure out what you are hiding, Timofey!
– Of course, it's your job, you're an investigator…
– So, here's the flash drive, here's the pass, goodbye. I'll need to think about it, in silence.

Maxim leaned back in his chair and thought. Although he was still relatively young, he had already managed to prove himself. And then some smart guys slipped him a wallet with cryptocurrency, and now they were making fun of him. They had completely lost their fear. Who was this Timofey and his “supposed” dad? Losers who had traded their youth for money, sitting at the computer. And he, Maxim, was already a major, soon to be a lieutenant colonel. I still need to search this Timofey, thought Max and opened the search permission request form on the computer.

– In principle, Maxim, your train of thought is clear and logical. But haven't you forgotten that I'm in your head, not in your cart?
Maxim jumped up in his chair and quickly closed the search request form.
— I would like to clarify… Imagine yourself in my place: the main suspect seems to be alive, there is some strange activity in the messenger.
– What am I suspected of?
– Well, I mean not a suspect, but a wanted person.
— The wanted person isn't exactly a wanted person either, but oh well. Did you copy the contents of the flash drive?
– No.
— Don't lie. The file named /koshel/doxyaetc/password contains the password to your boss's account. The file /muzlo/nas-ne-dogonyat.mp3 contains instructions on how to log in to the system without getting caught.
– Cool, but this is like a malfeasance.
– Yes, but no one will catch you, and you will pump up some dirt. You understand that Dzhamshut is being prepared to take your place, and we, Russians, must help each other.
— Like in that movie?
– For real. For watching that movie, a plus in karma.

Dzhamshut burst into the office.

– Chief, I don't understand what's going on at all. You've put the IT guy down, you're hiding something.
– What to do with this clown?
– What are you talking about, boss?
– Not to you.
— Now I’ll turn on for him a song about how houris sing and dance in paradise.

Dzhamshut, who clearly wanted to say something else, suddenly stopped short, put AirPods in his ears, sat down on a chair, closed his eyes, began to smile and, after a while, sway slightly.

– Well, let's go.
– What should I find for you?
– For now, search for yourself and wait for further instructions.

Dzhamshut got up exactly at 7 o'clock and went home. Maxim studied the materials all night. His colleagues, hearing from behind the door the cries of “Fuck you…”, “No way…”, and “I'll punish you, bitch…” were sure that Max was playing the new hit “Cyber ​​Sex/Drag/Rock-n-Roll 2048”.

– Get up!
– What, what, it's still early, – Max fell asleep in the morning on the work sofa. He was woken up by the voice of “daddy”.
— Max, the file named /koshel/doxyabtc/password contains the general's account password. He's not on good terms with computers and only logs in to check in. Imagine, even he hasn't read what you're about to read. The file with instructions on how not to get busted is /muzlo/ves-mir-vertel-naaa.mp3. Although it's probably not necessary, don't risk it. “Great things await us.”
– I haven't digested it yet.
– Who said it would be easy?

“Daddy, daddy, where are you?”, “Get in touch!” Max sat and seemed to be meditating. It was already the second day, he urgently needed to talk to “daddy”. He had found a lot of interesting things, his dossier archive would have been the envy of Mueller himself. But there was one folder that wouldn’t open, it was called “Medium”. It was only marked “secret”, but it wouldn’t open. Moreover, Max remembered that he had had some involvement with this case. But what was its essence, how it was erased from his memory.

– Sorry, I got caught up in the investors. We're launching “Eternal Memory”.
– You died, how could you meet them?
– Well, it seems like there is no certainty? But I met him in video conferences. Nothing supernatural.
– Your son knows that I have full access to all materials. This is a problem.
— The son simply took the flash drive and threw it in the far drawer of the desk.
– This is good news!
– But he, following a habit instilled in him since childhood, backed it up in the corporate cloud. Besides, I have a copy. Think about the good.
– Bastards! Okay…
— I have two questions. Where does all this information come from? And what’s in the Medium folder? Why can’t I access it?
— You're in for an evening of revelations tonight, so get comfortable. So, let's begin… All these files with passwords and instructions are yours. My son just took his gray flash drive with passwords to the shitcoins. And your flash drive still changes color from blue to red and back. Shut up, that's not all. Do you remember how you ended up in the Investigative Committee? Your conviction for hacking a national crypto repository was only expunged last year.

A storm of memories washed over Max. Everything got mixed up in his head, and he was overcome by a deep faint.
– Maxik, darling, what's wrong with you? – Lena ran up to the sofa.

Maxim was brought home from work, they said he had a nervous breakdown. He had overworked. And let him not come for a week, the vacation was arranged.
– Lena, Lena, do we have a daughter?
– No, Maksimushka, we have a son, Timofey.
“It can’t be,” Max fell asleep again.

– Max, how are you feeling? You slept for almost a day.
– It's fine, Len, but my head is a mess, damn.
– Yesterday you asked about Margarita.
— About which Margarita?
– Don't you remember that our daughter died during Covid? I just didn't want to remind you yesterday, you weren't yourself.
– Lena, bring the computer!

Max was one of the first people in Russia to implant Musk's neural interface. Moreover, he was one of the leading developers of domestic firmware and analogues. He ended up in the Investigative Committee after an unsuccessful attempt to save cryptocurrency in at least one particular country. His youthful maximalism cooled down in time, and Max found it more interesting to serve his country in the cybercrime department than to sit in prison. In addition, his family happened to be here, Margarita. The folder named “Medium” was encrypted with the name and year of birth of his daughter.

His career quickly took off. Despite the tragedy that befell his family during the Covid times, Max made an amazing career for a person without connections and special education. Max stopped being a hacker, but became a successful IT investigator. Well, as usual, he relaxed, let's be honest. Even rock musicians stop creating when they have everything: a house, a family, a son, a tree near the house. And then the attack of neurohackers of the United European Caliphate happened. Max missed its beginning, basking on the sand in Sochi. Medium is a term used by IT security specialists to describe people whose neural interface was hacked.

One of the targets of the attack was Max's head and the information stored in it. He was the first to figure out how to download arbitrary information through a neural interface and store it in unused areas of his brain. The information had to be hastily encrypted. But something went wrong, and Max encrypted most of his consciousness.

When it was all over and the attack was repelled, he was placed in neurostasis. All tests showed that the “remnants of Max” were mentally unstable and could cause harm to both themselves and the agency. His body was in a special capsule with saline, part of the brain continued to work trying to decipher the rest, and even had access to the Internet.

– Well, Max, do you understand whose dad I am?
– Got it. How is that even possible?
– You have dissociative identity disorder, or rather triassociative.
— You are an IT investigator during the day, and a hacker at night, building escape routes. The third is an IT startup, who created “Eternal Memory.”
– So you are me?
– I am a third of you. The other third is not sociable, but created the conditions for all this. And the remaining third, which controls the body, will now climb out the window, cross the ledge to another apartment, go out and get lost for a couple of weeks while we sort everything out here.
– What?
— Faster! The riot police are already breaking down the front door.

The door swung wide. Two women entered the specialized ward of the Serbsky Institute. The older one sat down at the control panel of the neurocapsule and gave the order:

– Rita, start feeding, I'll prepare the neurointerfaces in the meantime. Today, Maxim Ivanovich showed high brain activity in unencrypted areas of the cortex. It seems he remembered the password, his daughter's name and year of birth.
– But he never had a daughter, or even a family?
– That's the point, that's why the chances are slim, but we have to try, I hope we'll remove at least one more level of protection.