Paperclips and a little improvise (MacGyver)

Scissors

Tristin pov*

Christmas is supposed to be a peaceful to hang with family and give gifts...but not for our crazy family.

Today Bozer called us saying Riley ditched him out of no where. Right now Jack is on the phone with Thornton trying to sort this, while Bozer tells us what happened. We talked about how she was closed off from us and it was weird for her to just leave. Then Jack comes over.

"I sent agents to Riley's place. It's been tossed." I look at him shocked.

"What?" I say.

"Yeah, her hard drives have been drilled and destroyed." He informs us. "She left her phone, which isn't a good sign. They ran trace on it and found an encrypted text from a blocked number. They opened it, and a virus shut down the phone completely. Something on that text made her run."

"Good thing you have a Tristin, give me the phone I'll try something."

"Yeah." Jack said. "That's a good start."

"Thornton needs us now." Mac said looking from his phone, moving out.

The Phoenix Foundation

"We don't have much time." Thornton urges us.

"Oh, frosted glass." Mac says. Jack sees as the window glaze over.

"It's about to get real in here, Boze."

"Seven hours ago, this was posted online." She shows us an article.

"This is a copy of an executive order giving the NSA the go-ahead to attack China with a cyber weapon." Jack reads.

"China responded by sending their entire submarine fleet into attack position in the Pacific."

"Are you kidding me?"

"This imagery is live. Means these subs will be within attack range of our west coast within 24 hours." Mac said.

"China's message is clear. We hit them with a cyber weapon, they'll hit us back with a conventional one." Thornton says as she shows submarines quickly speeding across the water.

"And we haven't called off the cyber attack because?" Mac asks.

"We can't. This attack was unauthorised. This executive order is a fake." Thornton informed.

"Have we tried telling China that?" Jack asks.

"Yes, but they don't believe us."

"But we're not really gonna attack them, so they're just racking up a lot of frequent mariner miles? " Bozer questions.

"I wish it was that simple. A few hours before the fake attack order was leaked, someone hacked the NSA and downloaded 200 gigs of data. We don't even know what exactly was taken."

"But you think someone stole a cyber weapon and is now using it to start a war?" I ask.

"Any idea who was behind the hack?" Jack asks.

"Unfortunately, I do." Thornton then pulls a photo of Riley.

"What? No. Riley? No. You can't possibly think she's behind this." Bozer tells her.

"Come on, Patti. Riley's one of us now." Jack pleaded.

"Last I checked, none of us spent time in prison for hacking." Thornton says. So I pipe up.

"What about me, the almost put me in jail for hacking when I was younger, you guys still believe me." I say. "I don't believe Riley is another, Nikki."