BAITED BREATH

BAITED BREATH Part 3

"Good morning, class. Today we'll have that ethics lesson you've all been clamoring for."

Groans erupted from the second-semester students in John's computer lab.

"I'm sure some of you have already tried this at home. Without being detected, we're going to hack a computer, do a little creative writing, set up a sub-routine, erase our tracks, and finally, close the door."

"Can we make our student loans go away, Mr. Ballard?"

"No. You'd go to prison, and I'd lose my pension."

"Will anyone know what we did?"

"Perhaps." He smiled slyly to see if they were still game. "Raise your hand if you, or someone you know, got invited to the gala opening of the North Side Cultural Center."

Scoffs and snorts answered him.

"I'll take that as a no. Would any of you care to attend?" Several hands shot up.

"Okay. I've installed the necessary software. You'll have access to it on your terminals. When class is over, I'll uninstall it. It stands to reason that a secretary at Mr. Bronwell's corporate office has the invitation list."

        "Hey, Mr. Ballard. I'm already in."

"I believe you've done this before, Mr. Diaz." Ballard smelled artifice on the scrawny boy who was technically still in high school. The school district and a judge had determined that he needed to learn legal ways to use a computer. John logically assumed the kid was way ahead of him in hacking skills.

Students left their desks and peered over his shoulder while John's lips turned up in a complacent smile. The plan was afoot.

"Everyone, follow Mr. Diaz's lead. We're looking for a name and address file. I'd recommend sorting by date since it seems reasonable someone has been working on it since the announcement in the news."

"Found it!"

John stood behind Diaz and watched the young man's fingers fly across the keyboard. "That's what we're looking for. Does everyone see the fields? Besides the obvious name and address fields, there is a place to list a reason for that person to get an invitation."

Ballard went to his desk and typed a command. The information Diaz had accessed appeared on the whiteboard.

"Muslim youth leader, same-sex couple, blind artist, Latino cellist. Mr. Ballard, we don't fit the category. We're just a bunch of people trying to get an education."

John pointed out that most of them were Hispanic as he peered over shoulders at his students' progress.

"That's hardly a minority anymore, Mr. Ballard," Alberto Mesa said.

"Diaz and I could go as a same-sex couple," Andres Sanchez smirked.

"Dude, if you kiss me, I'll throat punch you."

"I'm out. I'm the most cis person here. You guys have fun without me," a redheaded girl said.

Ballard smelled her frustration.

"Thought you was Catholic, Angie."

She rolled her eyes and didn't explain her remark. "You know what I mean, Andres."

"Mr. Ballard, should we use our own addresses?"

Two students managed to invent a plausible reason to attend a diversity function. At his terminal, John added a line to the invitation list.

"Now we figure out if the invitations were printed on-site or sent to a specialty shop. Let's take a peek at the recent emails." He clicked another key on his terminal, and the information on the whiteboard changed. "Wasn't that thoughtful? His password is saved on his computer. People are so careless."

"Can you believe he named the file passwords? That's not careless. It's almost criminally stupid," Diaz's voice rose in indignation.

"Mr. Ballard, look at this," Angie said. "I tried sending the lines we added to the printer, and it's already set up with a custom paper. Should I go ahead and print and hope someone will put them in an envelope and mail them?"

"That's why we're here. It's the next best thing to breaking into someone's office. And might I repeat, do not attempt to do this at home. We've committed a harmless prank. We've trespassed in the computer files, but only accessed one, and might or might not have sent ourselves an invitation to an event attended by thousands."

He walked to the front of the room.

"Alright. Let's cover our tracks and back out of this computer." He accessed the instructions on the whiteboard. Once the room returned to normal, they discussed the ethics of their actions.

"Do you think I'll receive an invitation? You said people had already started getting theirs." Julian Sanchez had listed flamenco dancing.

"I wouldn't be surprised. It stands to reason that more names are being added to the list. If you don't, no big deal. Right? Whether or not you go depends on you."

*Sorry this was so short, but it sets the stage for Bree to have an invitation in hand at the gala opening.

Check in next Tuesday. Things are going to start happening...

Please vote and leave comments. As always, I appreciate that you are reading my story.