Sneaky, Crafty, not Smart

Once breakfast was finished and plans had been discussed, it was time for Steve to get started. He headed to the living room and turned on his laptop, while Laila and Maria retired to the study to talk some more about their own secret little plan while being surrounded by walls of books.

Steve attached a special gadget to his laptop that would broaden the WiFi-signals his laptop could receive. Not just those he could connect to but also the devices that transmitted a signal for itself to connect to the internet. With his software, he could change the settings of the device to not let all signals come through but only those that were between a certain distance from his location.

Once the signal names came pouring in, he began to search for any camera's that were attached to the internet. A lot of digital home security cameras, especially in neighbourhoods like these, where they have money to burn and want the best of the best, will be uploading their recordings on something like a cloud. Uploading on a cloud requires an internet connection, which makes them easy to find. Though most also have a memory card inside, it usually can't hold much footage because of the high quality of the footage. Though this sucked in case of a burglar, it was very helpful in their case.

After a few minutes of searching, he had found the internet portal that belonged to Olivia's house and let he let his software run to hack into it. Fortunately for him, Olivia was sneaky and crafty but not particularly smart. So, the password she had chosen had been very easy to hack. Just a few short minutes after starting the software, he was already inside her network. From there, it was very easy for him to see which devices were connected to that network and one by one he hacked into the necessary devices. In total Olivia had seven camera's in and outside of the house, three of which were inside the house.

Since he didn't want to give Olivia any reason to be suspicious about Laila's visit, he didn't go with the easiest solution. Which would be to simply copy a part of the recording and loop it. Because if he did that now, it would show an empty living room and that would be strange considering that is the most like place for them to sit while Laila was there. So, instead he would be watching the visit live and have Laila signal him. He would then copy a part of the recording and stick it over the part where Laila is placing the camera and the microphone. He would repeat that process for each room that Laila planned on entering.

Unfortunately they couldn't keep watching Olivia through her own cameras because they had been placed for a very different purpose, meaning that only specific corners of the house were in frame. Most likely for burglary purposes. Not suitable to keep track of someone's every move. Besides, they needed audio as well and that too was not possible with the cameras in place. Another important reason was because the odds of someone from security finding out about his hack if they used it for a longer period of time was too high to risk it. So, it was best to continue with their plan as it was even with the discovery of Olivia's home security cameras.

Once he had set up his backdoor into Olivia's network and home security system, he went on to see if there were any other interesting devices for him to hack into while he was busy anyways. That is when he noticed her laptop and her phone had been connected to the WiFi as well. The only problem was, she couldn't look at them while he was getting into them. So, he thought it was better if he waited with that until later in the day when there were plenty of distractions for her to not grab her phone or laptop. Then again, it might be easier for them to get into her phone in person, than to try getting into it from over here. That way he could focus on the laptop instead. But this was something he would discuss with Noah and see what he thought about it before taking any action.

One quick call later he got Noah's approval and his word that he would bring a signal jammer and a portable phone hacking device along. Making Steve done with the tasks he had been given in preparation for today's mission. Being done with his main tasks so quickly, Steve decided to go look for Maria and Laila. He walked around from room to room until he heard their voices coming from the study. He walked over and caught a fraction of their conversation before they stopped talking when they noticed him coming in.

Fortunately for them he had only heard Maria say, "-that way dinner will be served around 6:30." Neither Laila nor Maria had expected him to be done so fast with tasks that sounded so complex. So, seeing Steve in front of them so suddenly, they couldn't think of another topic fast enough. Instead they tried to cover the silence up with an awkward laughter. Steve didn't understand what was so funny based on what he had heard but he just went along with it as he took a seat across from them and said, "What dinner are we talking about? Dinner tonight?"