Reasonable Doubt ☁︎

⑪ 『A New Page』

It's been some time since Blackhat has felt such rage. Such burning rage, that sets your insides aflame until you trample out the start of it all. And he's losing control over it.

All this undercover work with these Podemos Bailar sorts has got the demon pissed beyond belief. To think some group of brainless goody-two-shoes are challenging the Blackhat organization and all those belonging to it is absolutely humiliating. Infuriating. "I'll kill them all," he repeats over and over, his voice slowly distorting as his form starts to catch fire.

Before he can loose his grip on whatever form of sanity a demon has, the pitter-patter of shoes on a wall grounds his anger. Dementia. The only being that would provoke him while he's this. Fucking. Close. To destroying everything in a mile's radius.

"Mr. Blackhat!" She chimes, sending a salute as she stares down at him. "I know you're super duper angry, but you don't wanna burn down your evil mansion thing do ya?" Blackhat blinks, narrowing his brows in surprise. That was... rational. Did I just imagine that? "Naw thereya go sir, what's wrong? Why'ya been so fiery?" She giggles at the pun, but smartly stays where she is. Dementia may be a thrill seeker, but she's careful about it. "I'll be needing Slys." "Sly? Sly who? Is this a joke? Man, I didn't know ya told jokes BH!" Blackhat's eye twitches. "Doctor Flug." "What?? His first name is Slys?? Or is it last? Haha! Sounds gross! And lame. I could start calling him slugs. Or 'Slug Flys!!' Haha. Hmmm..." she rubs her chin in contemplation, but quickly notices the demon's attitude shifting. "Ya got it boss, one sluggy boy right to ya!" She crawls out of the room without difficulty.

Breathing in deeply, Blackhat leans against his desk. He was able to decode the cipher. ADFGVX. Basic research revealed that the cipher was created by Germans during World War 1. It uses a matrix grid, where each letter in the grid is replaced by random with another. The cipherer, as indicated by the abc123 hint, simply went through the grid by the alphabet up to z, then 0-9.

Just a simple message really. And Blackhat solved it in 3 minutes. Yet, it's been hours. And it won't stop repeating in his mind.

We can do worse, Cooper.

Cooper. Cooper, Cooper, Cooper. That stupid son of a bitch. I'll find him. And when I do. Hah. I'll make sure to find the rest of them. Scramble his brain with psychological torture. Scramble his insides too, by hand. Cut him open careful and slow, drinking in those screams like fruit punch. Keep him alive for as long as humanly possible. And when he finally dies, I'll have Slys bring him back. Not that he'd complain, surely. My genius is a madman.

"S-sir?" Speak of the devil. "You sent for me?" Blackhat's eyes train on Flug, his senses heightened greatly due to his intense rage. He can see the fear radiating off the man. And that obvious sense of sexual confusion. Blackhat is not dealing with that right now. "Look at this," he says, tossing the folder to the front of his desk. The act causes Flug's fear to be overpowered by his undying sense of curiosity, and he approaches the table, opening the file. "The dog eared page." Blackhat closes his eyes and pinches where the bridge of his nose would be. Flug flips to it, pausing to read the deciphered item. He plops the file back to the desk.

"Infiltrated... I never would have thought." "So you got it right away. Bravo, Slys." Flug's shoulders lift up. "T-thank you Blackhat sir..." The demon feels a slight twinge in his chest. "Doesn't matter. Your task is to dig up all information humanly possible on this Cooper." Flug nods, though the demon can't see the act.

"Well, he must have some sort of understanding on German cryptography." Blackhat's brow raises, leaning forwards on his desk again. "So you know something about that," he starts. Sure, Blackhat found basic information, but perhaps his doctor knows more. "Elaborate." The scientist blinks, thinking nothing of it. "Right, well, this cipher. It's called—" "I know what it's called, I fucking solved it." "R-right, right, well it was commonly used by the German army in—" "Puta madre, do you know anything else on this topic that I couldn't find online??"