The Child Thief Read online

  “How many listings are on this platform?” I asked, still gaping.

  “I don’t know yet,” she replied. “I’ve only managed to access one page so far, what you see here. I was planning to try to trace the details of the admin of the site, to see if there’s any way I can anonymously rat them out to the government. I’m guessing the kids would be in better hands even with the CRAS.”

  I looked at her, once again impressed by her maturity. “That’s really brave of you, Gabby. Are you sure you’re taking proper security measures to make sure nobody can track you down?”

  “Oh, yeah. I don’t do anything in the shadows without several layers of encryption.”

  “Good,” I said. Even on the ocean, I worried that if she pissed off the wrong criminals, they could find a way of getting to her. Especially if they were making a lot of money through this kind of operation. I wondered what type of person could stoop to running a site like that. Then I realized it could very well be people who weren’t dissimilar to me and my colleagues. Perhaps whose technical operations were even close to Nelson’s, and other groups operating out of OH. The only difference was where the children ended up. People who stole them and then, instead of giving them back to their birthparents, sold them. Which was a sobering reminder that anything in this world could be used for good and bad.

  I hoped Gabby would figure out a way to crack it, because people like that needed to be taken down. And with the time and dedication she seemed to have, I wouldn’t put it past her.

  But I put thoughts of that site aside for now, because I wasn’t sure how much longer I had in here with her, and a different subject had surfaced in my head—one I’d actually been wanting to bring up the moment she mentioned hacking.

  “Do you know anything about the government’s adoption archives?” I asked. She had obviously spent a lot of time browsing the shadow web, or in the shadows, as she referred to it. It seemed possible that she could’ve read a discussion on it or something. Perhaps seen someone else talking about their attempts to crack it.

  But she shook her head. “Nope. I think my mom would probably slaughter me if I tried to touch anything even remotely government-related.”

  “Oh, yes,” I said quickly. “I’m not encouraging you to try. I just wondered if you might have come across anything.”

  “Yeah, I haven’t. Sorry.”

  The sound of footsteps outside drew my attention away from the screen and reminded me that Gabby’s elders would likely not approve of what we’d just been discussing.

  “Where have you taken her, girl?” I sat up straighter as the familiar voice of the brunette mother drifted in through the cracks in the door. “Few minutes sittin’ with a guest and you run off with her!”

  Gabby quickly dimmed the screen and turned to look at me with a heavy sigh. “Looks like it’s time for you to go.”

  Her dismay touched me, and I almost wished I could stay a bit longer just for her sake, but I had an idea of how I could ease the blow a little for her. “Hey, are you a member of OH?” I asked.

  “Yup,” she replied.

  “Add me to your circle, then. I’m RobinHood21.”

  Her face lit up like fireworks. “Oh my God, I will. I’m GabbySails! All one word, same as on my network!”

  “Thanks. I can give you my number, too, if you have a way to call me,” I added. Honestly, she was a smart cookie, and her computer skills made her the kind of person who could be useful as a contact, especially when the only other tech I was close to was Nelson. Plus, I wanted to know how it went with that kidnapping site.

  And if I could help make her life saner along the way, by giving her someone she could talk to, then that was all the better.

  “That’s even awesomer!” she practically squealed. “I promise I won’t call you much.”

  “It’s fine,” I said, smiling. “I’d like you to let me know how things go with that site, as well as if you come across anything about the archives during your shadow web crawls.”

  “Sure thing!”

  She gave me a pad and a piece of paper, and I scrawled my number on it. And when I handed it back to her, she pulled me into a hug. I hugged her back awkwardly, given the cramped space, and then she leaned over me to push open the door, and we both made our way out.

  Hux and her mother were standing in the hallway, waiting, and the woman gave her daughter a mildly disapproving look. “What were you two doing in there?” she asked with a frown. Hux was looking at me with confusion, too.

  “Just hanging out,” Gabby replied with a shrug.

  “Yup, just hanging out,” I repeated, keeping to her version of the truth, as she had now confirmed my suspicion that her mother likely didn’t know about her hacking endeavors. “You ready to leave, then?” I asked Hux.

  He nodded. “Yeah. All done.”

  “Okay, great.”

  Then, just as the woman was leading us back to the living area, the hoard of children came spilling down the staircase and swarmed around us.

  “You goin’ already?” Rufus asked, wide-eyed, while several of the other kids asked variations of the same question.

  “Afraid so,” I replied, ruffling his curly hair.

  Gabby kept close behind me as we returned to the trap door, then waited as her mother opened it.

  “We should touch the dock in about a minute,” the woman explained. “So head down and wait for the ramp to open.”

  “Thanks for your hospitality, ma’am,” Hux said, shaking her hand, and then nodding to the rest of the adults still in the room.

  “Thanks, ma’am,” I echoed, shaking her hand as well.

  “No, thank you two, for coming,” one of the men replied. “This new initiative sounds like it’ll be real interesting.”

  And hopefully also helpful.

  Hux nodded, and then the two of us climbed down the ladder, descending once more into the damp gloom.

  Gabby and as many of the other children as could fit peered down at us through the hole as we waited for the ramp to fall. I waved one last time to all of them before we walked across the ramp and out of sight. The ramp started withdrawing again almost as soon as our feet had touched the pier, and the ship quickly motored away, back into the darkness.

  We watched it go for about a minute in silence, and then Hux turned his back on the ocean. “Let’s head back,” he said.

  I nodded, and we took off at a brisk walk down the pier.

  “So what did that girl actually want with you?” he asked, frowning. “It was pretty weird the way she pulled you out of the room.”

  “Yeah, about that,” I said, having been about to broach the topic with him myself. “Her name’s Gabby, and she seems like a smart kid. She had a computer in that little cupboard room and is in the process of designing her own social network for homeschoolers. She’s also a self-taught hacker.” I proceeded to explain about the kidnapping ring’s site she was attempting to crack, and by the time I’d finished, Hux’s eyes were wide.

  “That’s disgusting,” he said, the corners of his mouth turning down.

  “I know. I’m hoping she’ll figure out a way to take it down. And back to the subject of Gabby: I think she could be a good asset to the new portal, so if you’ve decided to invite her parents, which I’m guessing you have, I suggest you invite her too. Her handle’s GabbySails.”

  “Yeah, I’m planning to invite them. And I’ll send off an invite to her, too.”

  “Good,” I said, and then there was a pause as we reached the end of the pier and took off down the station road. “What is their group actually known for in the OH community?” I asked. “I mean, what was it that flagged them as a trustworthy group? How did they earn their reputation?” It was a key piece of information that I hadn’t gotten out of Gabby during the brief time we’d talked. We’d ended up getting too sidetracked with her shadow web projects.

  “They help fellow OH members, occasionally,” Hux replied. “From what they told me, it’s mostly people
who’re in need of emergency hiding places. They let folks on board their boat temporarily, until the dust settles.”

  “Oh, I see. Well I guess that’s brave, to say the least, for them to take that risk of inviting someone into their home.”

  “Yes,” Hux replied. “I think their hearts are definitely in the right place. And they do seem brave, if a little eccentric.”

  I smiled. “Yeah, well, sharing that small space for decades will probably do that to a person.”

  He chuckled, shaking his head. “Rather them than me, that’s all I’ll say.”

  “I’m guessing back where you’re from, you had tons of space to stretch those long legs of yours,” I remarked, my eyes dropping automatically to the lengthy strides he was taking.

  He gave me a bemused look, his lips curving in a half smile.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Long legs?”

  I shrugged. “They are long, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah… I guess it’s just not a descriptor I’m used to being on the end of, as a guy.”

  I smirked. “Well, take it as a compliment.”

  “Okay… And to answer your question, yes. I’d sometimes be gone for days at a time, when hunting for food in the winter.”

  Our conversation trailed off as we reached the station entrance. We both stopped, and I was turning to look at him, wondering if he had commuted by train today, too, when a ringing suddenly erupted from his coat pocket.

  He dipped a hand inside and pulled out his phone, and his face darkened as he glanced at the screen. He swallowed hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing, and I couldn’t help but feel that this call might be related to the conversation I’d caught him in earlier, the one that had put him in such a bitter mood.

  “I’m sorry, Robin,” he muttered. “I gotta take this call now. I’ll… I’ll be in touch about the next visitation tomorrow, in case you want to come again, okay?”

  “Oh, yeah, okay,” I replied, then watched as he turned on his heel and swiftly crossed the road, pressing the phone to his ear as he headed into the shadows of the parking lot beyond.

  My mind once again mulled over what this whole issue could be about, but thoughts of more important things soon distracted me as I walked back through the station barriers. Like that awful kidnapping site. The fact that such things even existed disturbed me deeply. I couldn’t bring myself to imagine what it would feel like to have my own child listed there. At least under the CRAS, Hope would have been taken in by a responsible family, who might not give her the love she deserved, but would at least look after her, the way the Sylvones had looked after me (until I was seventeen, anyway).

  And I wondered how many other sites like that existed. Sites that we didn’t even know about. Especially considering that Gabby’s discovery of this one had been pure dumb luck.

  The bitter side of me blamed its existence on the CRAS, wanting to believe that it had encouraged a culture of commodifying children, with so many wealthy people “collecting” them. Even though I knew that wasn’t entirely fair. Evil like this, in one form or another, had existed since the beginning of written history… though I couldn’t imagine that initiatives like the CRAS helped.

  But regardless of whose fault it was, the whole subject got me thinking, as I climbed aboard my train and settled into a window seat, that maybe, once we got organized, the portal could have a broader scope. Maybe we could take a leaf out of Gabby’s book and target criminals whenever we came across them.

  And then I realized, a few minutes into those musings, that we couldn’t stretch ourselves too thin. There wasn’t an unlimited number of us, nor would we have unlimited resources, and taking on the CRAS alone was a massive task.

  We needed focus as a group. So perhaps we were going to have to leave this kind of work to Gabby’s free time after all.

  I sighed and leaned back, my eyes glazing over against the lights whizzing past the window, though the subject lingered in the back of my head throughout the journey home.

  13

  I had been so distracted by the evening’s events that I almost forgot about the invitation to the new portal that I was supposed to be receiving that evening. I remembered a minute after I stepped through the front door of my cabin, and after using the bathroom and grabbing a bottle of Nurmeal, I settled into bed and logged on to Operation Hood.

  The little red number hovering above the messages tab told me that I had two new emails, and I quickly clicked to open my inbox. A small smile played on my lips as I saw that the most recent was a friend request from Gabby. I checked the time it had arrived and realized she had sent it about ten minutes after we left. It came with a little note:

  “Hey, Robin. Thanks for visiting us today. Look forward to seeing what happens with Nathan’s new project. Hopefully I get an invite along with my parents. In the meantime, I’ll keep chipping away at those shadow bastards.

  - Gabby x”

  I typed a quick reply:

  “Thanks for having us. And yes, I hope to see you around in the new portal. Good luck with that project. Keep me posted and stay safe. R. x”

  And then I returned to my inbox. I was eager to check the second message, which was indeed an invite to the new portal. It had been sent by one of the admins: ZombieBrainz. I frowned, wondering for a moment if that might be Nathan, but I had no way of knowing, so I proceeded to click on the link provided in the message. It led me to a blank login page. Since no new username or password had been included in the message, I supposed my main OH credentials would work, and I entered them.

  They worked. The login page disappeared, and the next screen that flashed up was a familiar interface. Its minimalistic gray-and-brown design was like the main network’s, except this was a stripped-down version, with a group forum being the most prominently displayed module.

  The site’s official opening was supposed to be next Monday, so this had to be a beta version. Nathan must still be working on the bells and whistles, but released it early to get the new recruits in ASAP. And there were already eleven active members browsing the forum. I clicked on the link to add one to that number and found, to my excitement, that there were three conversation threads, all of them with intriguing titles:

  “First stunt…”

  “Facilities/resources you can put on the table”

  “Changing perspectives”

  As well as a pinned post at the top:

  “Security best practices: READ FIRST”

  Before I could click on any of them, however, my phone rang. I leapt off the mattress to fetch it from where I’d left it in the living room and checked the screen. It was Nelson.

  “Hey,” I said, answering the call. I put it on loudspeaker and set the device down on my mattress.

  “Hey,” her voice came back, slightly morphed and crackly thanks to our encryption protocol. “I see you logged in to the new portal. You back home now?”

  “Yes. You received the invite too?” I asked.

  “Yup. I’m logged in and looking at your glowing green avatar as we speak.”

  “Where do I find the full list of members?” I asked, searching around for it.

  “It’s just under the—”

  “Ah, yeah, I got it,” I replied, having just spotted the link at the bottom, beneath the forum.

  I blew out as the list appeared. There were eleven active members in the forum, but thirty members in the portal already. Granted, many of those were probably admins, but still, this was happening! There had been talk of the portal all week, but actually seeing it in the flesh sent a thrum of excitement through me.

  I scanned the list to find that Nelson, Julia, Marco, and the twins had already joined, and were all showing up as online. I frowned when I saw that Jackie wasn’t there, but then shook it off. Maybe she had just been busy this evening.

  Davine and Noreen were also there, though currently showing as offline, but Gabby and her family were still waiting for their invites, it seemed. Hux had only just recruite
d them a couple of hours ago, though, so I supposed they’d receive theirs tomorrow sometime.

  “Have you checked out the forum yet?” Nelson asked.

  “No,” I said, quickly navigating back over to the forum. “I was just about to when you called. I’m back in there now.”

  “I just wondered if you’d read through any of the comments yet under ‘First stunt.’”

  “Let me go in there now.” I clicked on the thread and began to read. A guy (or girl) whose profile name was Zion Rey (handle: LionZion) was the thread starter.

  “Obviously, this requires a lot of thought and discussion, but interested to hear everyone’s initial ideas on what our first move could/should be, once we’re all in here…”

  To my amusement, Abe had been the first to reply:

  “Something that doesn’t get us all killed.”

  “Yeah, I figured that was kind of a given…” Zion replied, evidently not catching on to Abe’s humor.

  “A mass robbery of a holding center,” a girl (or guy) with the profile name Winter De Ville (SnowQueen) suggested.

  “I’d say that falls under the above-mentioned category,” Marco had replied, less than a minute after Winter posted.

  “Agreed,” Nelson had added curtly, along with several others.

  And I would agree with them, too. Holding centers were facilities where kids were sometimes kept by the Ministry, when immediate delivery to a family wasn’t possible. For example, if they lived in another part of the country, or the paperwork/adoption admin fee transfer was delayed. I’d never visited one, but from what I’d heard, they were always well populated by nurses looking after the children, along with twenty-four-hour security, to prevent kidnapping rings from getting any funny ideas.

  Plus, it would be a horribly crude way to introduce ourselves to the world. We stole children, yes, but we also had discrimination regarding which ones we targeted. At least, the people I worked with did. Not only did we have an age limit, but we also only took back what was ours—or more specifically, the families’ we were helping.