The Boy with Blue Hair

Chapter 10

From Feeling the Blue: A Complete Examination on the Case of William Clayton by Ralph Dibney (pg. 40)

Published via Star Labs, April 2, 2028

Alena Kacey Whitlock was born and raised in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, on August 6, 1992. For most of her childhood, life seemed pretty stable until her older sister committed suicide in the winter of 2005. A few months later, her parents divorced, and Alena went to live with her father.

During her years at Templeton Secondary School, she became involved with the world of hacktivism. Eventually, Alena aspired to become one herself after learning of Felicity Smoak's cyber breach of the US Department of Education in 2009. After graduating in the class of 2010, Alena went on to study at the University of British Columbia.

During her college days, she joined and participated in a student-run hacktivist group that was actually a Canadian branch of the worldwide notorious hacktivist organization, Helix. Once graduating with a degree in Computer Science in 2014, Alena traveled to the United States on a work visa. At the time, she had been recruited by Helix's leader and founder, Cayden James, to pursue an internship at their office branch in Star City.

Following the end of her internship, Alena became a dual Canadian-US citizen. After settling down in Star City, she continued to work under the mentorship of Cayden James. Eventually, Alena became a skilled hacker known to the digital world as Kojo Sledgehammer and participating in procuring approximately eight petabytes of data from the NSA's information-gathering program ECHELON, in 2016. Helix stored this information in a flash drive, often referring to it by the name of Pandora. Alena used this information as a means to help Felicity Smoak after encountering her idol in 2017 not only to clear John Diggle from his predicament with the military but also to bring Felicity back to her hacktivist days.

That same week, Felicity accepted her offer to join Helix. For a short while, the hackers worked together until Helix was forced to go into hiding due to Felicity's connection with the Green Arrow becoming a liability.

Several months afterward, in November of 2017, Alena joined forces with Felicity Smoak again. This time, she asked her former associate to stop Cayden James from enacting a plan that would have resulted in a global casualty of approximately 300 million people.

Although Alena became an ally to the Green Arrow and his comrades, she was forced to go incognito once the Green Arrow revealed his identity to the world. For a few months, she remained hidden from the public eye until Black Siren, who had already reached out to Erik Needham and Kirk Langstrom by then, tracked her down. Once Alena met the Earth-2 assassin, she was given an offer that could not be dismissed.

"I guess you already know who I am." Alena shifted in her shoes uncomfortably. Both Thea and Felicity gave searing-hot glares at the hacktivist, gripping each other's hands so neither would lunge at the woman. They both wanted to unleash a stream of expletives on the woman who played a tremendous role in turning their son and nephew into a weapon.

Both Thea and Felicity knew better; finding William was far more crucial than losing both of their tempers at this moment.

They looked at each other, and they silently agreed that once William was found, both of them would have a nice and long chat with Alena.

"What are you doing here?" Thea barely spoke through a set of clenched molars, with her burgundy painted fingernails curling in Felicity's palm.

"I just came to tell you that we're just getting ready to leave for Hope Springs," Alena told them. "And that we're going to keep you guys updated up to the second. We'll move forward from there to the school and every place William has visited up to the time he came to Star City." Her words did nothing to soothe the silent storm brewing within the minds of the sisters-in-law.