The Pentagon Got Wrecked by a Middle Schooler

The Pentagon site got completely wrecked by a middle schooler, right?

It was the very symbol of American defense, the final boss that every hacker on the planet used as a measuring stick for their own skill. Just cracking it once could earn you legendary fame, which was why tens of thousands of intrusion attempts hammered its walls every single year. That place was the Pentagon.

Even the people who worked there were the cream of America’s talent pool, carefully selected and vetted. Yet incidents that pushed them past their limits still erupted day after day without end.

Fortunately, most departments inside the Pentagon were enjoying a rare stretch of quiet today. That fleeting peace was shattered the moment a warning siren blared from the situation room.

Wheeeeee—!

“Haaah… for the love of—”

“How the hell did they get past the AI…? Why do the hacking methods keep getting more advanced every time…?”

Faces around the room crumpled under the weight of the intrusion report flagged by the Network Intrusion Prevention System.

The firewalls and NIPS currently running at the Pentagon were technologies said to be at least a decade ahead of anything publicly acknowledged. Ordinary hacking attempts were casually neutralized by the onboard artificial intelligence alone. Unlike a simple firewall, the system could actively cut off intrusion paths and respond with real initiative.

But if the sirens inside the situation room itself were screaming, it meant the basic firewalls and defensive layers had already been torn down.

“Seriously, what’s even the point of hacking the Pentagon…?”

“Plenty, senior. Fame, classified intel, the world’s attention…”

The staff traded jokes to lighten the mood, but as the situation grew steadily worse their expressions hardened again.

“This is… a completely new hacking method, isn’t it? You ever seen anything like this?”

“No… not that I know of.”

“Even the AI couldn’t make a proper call. That’s probably why it got escalated all the way to us.”

“No way… it still won’t get through, right?”

“Of course not. This is the brand-new security program that hasn’t allowed a single breach in the six months since it went live.”

They marveled at the hacker’s skill, yet on the other side of the same breath they still placed absolute faith in their own defenses. The program had been built by pouring every scrap of funding the cyber-security division could scrape together. Aside from a handful of freak exceptions, it had kept the Pentagon’s secrets perfectly sealed. Being brand-new, it still had a few rough edges, but every would-be intruder who met it for the first time simply crumpled against that iron wall.

“Well, all we have to do is sit tight and get ready to track the poor bastard who kneels in front of the new security suite.”

“Should we loop in the FBI?”

“Eh… I don’t think we need to go that far. Just call the local cops and have them pick the guy up.”

“Yeah, fair. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠The FBI’s not exactly sitting around with free time.”

“Exactly. So senior, hurry up and help me check the access path—wait, huh?”

“What? What’s wrong…?”

The staff could not tear their eyes from the monitors. The situation on the screens defied every scrap of common sense.

“Am I… reading this right?”

“Looks like you are…?”

Four short lines plastered dead-center across the Pentagon’s own website. The same brief message had been translated into nearly every language on Earth—English, Chinese, Russian, and more—and the content was simply impossible to believe.

“This is… a dream, right? I’m seeing things?”

“Want me to hit you?”

“Yeah.”

CRACK—!

“I hit you.”

“Uuuuurgh… gaaaaah… blaaargh…”

“Oh right. I never mentioned my unique ability is physical enhancement, did I?”

“You… you think you’ll walk away from this… blaaargh…”

“We’re both getting fired tomorrow anyway. Why bother caring?”

“…”

At the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠same moment, dozens of phones began to ring. Every single call came from someone far too important to ignore—yet not one of the hackers could bring themselves to answer. The staff simply stared at one another with blank faces. A few finally staggered toward the computers to take the site down; others moved to pick up the phones.

Communities across every country were on fire. Some boldly speculated about the identity of the person who had dared to deface the Pentagon’s website; others trembled at the thought of poking the American eagle’s beak. While they traded theories, they all waited for the U.S. government’s official response that was sure to come soon.

Two days later that statement finally hit the world’s media outlets. Its contents were as follows:

In the end they had failed to catch the culprit, and the government’s claim that nothing beyond the website itself had been harmed only poured more fuel on the fire. Online debates raged—from calls for a complete overhaul of Defense Department personnel to wild theories that the whole thing was a self-staged American stunt. Copycat crimes sprang up in the wake of the incident. Of course, every imitator quickly met the iron fist of justice and was dragged off to prison.

Despite endless media demands for further explanation, the Department of Defense issued that single statement and then simply stonewalled. And one woman watched the steadily escalating storm with quiet amusement.

“Waaah~ look at it burn~”

[…]

I hadn’t planned it this way, but the international press was shaking the Defense Department so thoroughly that the investigation was moving far slower than I had expected. Maybe plastering that mocking message right across the front page had been a better idea than I thought.

[By the way, why did you leave that particular message on the site?]

“That? Nothing special. After a job I usually leave some kind of mark, you know?”

Mercenaries who worked in the shadows almost never turned down a chance at fame. The higher your reputation, the better the contracts that came your way—and better contracts meant more money. ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠That was why so many of them loved to brag about their exploits. Leaving a personal signature had been a classic way to build that reputation for as long as anyone could remember.

“At first I was going to leave Lucifer’s mark, but that would’ve put me straight on America’s radar. Instant suspect list.”

[True.]

“Even so, I don’t think they’d actually dig up my real identity… but the Lucifer name is tangled up with way too many things.”

Iris the hero, Yekaterina, Leviathan, my relationships with various villains, the reputation itself—none of it was something I could afford to throw away. If I had stamped Lucifer’s seal on the Pentagon, they would have connected the dots to the hacker working under Leviathan in no time, and I would have had to abandon the identity half-finished.

“But just walking away without leaving any mark at all felt too disappointing.”

So I borrowed the idea from a billboard-hacking incident I had seen in my previous life.

[In other words, you just wanted to do something attention-seeking.]

“…”

This brat’s skill at talking back to her master was improving by the day. One of these days I was going to catch her and give her a proper education.

“More importantly… the haul was pretty decent.”

The real reason I had risked everything to crack the Pentagon: I had found the key needed to complete Project Darwin.

“…”

Honestly, I still wasn’t sure whether I could actually pull it off.