Credit Rush OutPost Krone Read Online Free Page B

decided there was some hacking that had to be done—his favourite hobby.
    The amount he had gained over the years would have surely bought him a way out of his crummy apartment, but he had debts to pay off. He owed money to various gangs back on Earth; they had been his ticket to survival. .
    Over the years overdue payments to gangs back on Earth started to add up, if he had not escaped he would be with the others out there, powering the furnaces day and night or even worse.
    Charlie was smuggled on board a ship with others carrying atmospheric equipment. It had stopped for refuelling on a tanker rig; he had paid someone off to get him on-board their ship and a passage to the Krone system and was lucky to get away with it.
    “Right; let’s make some money,” said Charlie as he brought the holographic screen back to life.
    “Anyone got some tidy accounts around here? There must be some rich pickings,” said Charlie, growing impatient—it was his greatest weakness.
    After a couple of minutes he noticed a weak security connection on the screen. It was not coming from this planet, but the signal emitting somewhere from up in space. The connection became weaker as Charlie struggled to lock onto it.
    “Come on, you should be an easy target,” said Charlie confidently.
    After a couple of minutes he had finally located his prize and the information was feeding through onto the screen fast. Charlie was not in for much luck today, there was not that much data traffic floating about with a decent credit balance apart from this one. He leaned forward as he tapped the keys in front of him. After a few moments he finally got to where he wanted to be—the victim’s credit balance.
    “Bingo, gotcha,” Charlie said excitedly.
    “Yes, fifty thousand credits in that balance; that should do just fine.”
    The account did not belong to your average space pilot, or even a rogue, but someone with a much higher income take. Tapping away at more keys with his fingertips he locked onto some more dialogue and Charlie decided to take a closer look.
     
    Doctor S Johnson,
    Chief Medical Personnel,
    HMS Liverpool
     
    “A doctor… and British,” said Charlie laughing. Charlie had been born in the UK and had lived there for a couple of years but then moved overseas before leaving Earth.
    Moving the cursor up and down, Charlie started to break the pieces of information so he could pinpoint the exact position for the hack. Whoever this doctor was, the security at the other end was poor. It could well be a medical frigate up there but Charlie had no need for drugs, just credits.
    Charlie began to tap in the code and found it easier than he thought it would be.
    “Easy does it. I should be fine, got a three minute window of no security before his firewall kicks in again,” said Charlie; his thumb hovering eagerly over a key and ready to strike.
    He went for it. It took less than a minute to drain the credit account of an unknowing victim and transfer the funds to his own account. Charlie had to lose the connection fast and send a dummy decoy to a location that was not his. Quickly tapping his fingers onto the keyboard he punched in some coordinates. The signal had disappeared from his location. However, the local security police at the other end had been alerted by the breach as the star system was known for fraudulent activity and there was a clamp down on it at the moment. The security police quickly located the fake signal attached to a random person on an unnamed planet and they would soon pay a visit.
    “Suckers, someone will be getting a nasty surprise in a couple of days,” thought Charlie, delighting in his work.
    Filling up his travel bag, he got ready for the nine month outing. He had to leave and make his way to the docking bay. Richard would be waiting for him there and his downtime would be over. Walking over to the balcony windows, Charlie tapped on the glass and an atmospheric neon notice appeared in front of him. It stated