Digimon Fan Fiction ❯ A New Face Among Many ❯ Blackmail And Why It Works ( Chapter 3 )

[ P - Pre-Teen ]

A New Face Among Many - Chapter 3: Blackmail And Why It Works

I'm glad that's over. I just hope he doesn't find out who it was. Reliana was back in her apartment making cookies. She always did that when she was nervous or anxious.

There was a knock at the door and Reliana nearly jumped out of her skin. She quickly put the cookies in the oven and set the timer. After smoothing down her hair and wiping flour off her face she opened the door. It was Izzy. Tai and Matt were behind him, perhaps for moral support.

Izzy could tell Reliana was afraid. She was pale and bravely trying to smile. She smelt like cookies, which was something Izzy didn't expect.

"Are you three coming in, or are you going to stand in the hall all day?"

The boys followed Reliana into her apartment and sat at the kitchen table. She had gotten them all something to drink when the timer dinged from in the kitchen. "You caught me at a bad time. I'm baking cookies. Do you trust my cooking skills enough to try them?"

Matt and Tai laughed. Izzy looked away almost guiltily.

"They smell good enough, Reliana. Of course we'll try some." Matt spoke for the three of them.

Oh, God, he knows. He's trying to hide the fact, but he does know. What am I going to do? Her hands were shaking as she placed the cookies on a serving plate. She grabbed herself a drink from the fridge and walked back into the combination dining room and living room. She placed the plate of cookies on the table.

* * *

Please, Izzy, you can't be having second thoughts about this. But he was. She looked so sweet in her short t-shirt that was dusted with flour, the figure hugging jeans… Get a grip! It's almost as if you had a crush on this girl!

For those of you who don't know Izzy, it is very rare for him to become obsessed with anything other than newfangled technology. There is an exception, however, to every rule.

* * *

"Izzy, is something wrong?" Reliana had noticed Izzy's silence and was quite worried by it.

"Yeah, there is. I have a slight problem and I wanted to ask for your help in resolving it."

Matt and Tai were startled by Izzy's abrupt approach. They tried to fade into the background as much as possible, but they reached forward for just one more of Reliana's home-made cookies every once and a while.

"What kind of problem, Izzy?"

Instead of replying, Izzy pulled his laptop from his backpack along with a large manila envelope. He passed Reliana the envelope and booted up his computer.

Reliana slowly opened the envelope and stared herself in the face. She blinked, and the image remained. These were pictures of her in a phone booth… with her laptop… Reliana looked up.

"In return for the program known as 'KillSwitch' I will not take that evidence to the authorities, Mouse." Izzy was smug.

He's blackmailing me! And to think I had a crush on him! Of all the nerve, who does he think he is? Reliana's eyes hardened. She'd show him. "Izzy, did you hook you laptop into your server last night?"

The unrelated question caught Izzy off guard. "Yeah, why?"

Reliana didn't seem to be listening. She was staring at her watch. "Count to…" She looked directly at Izzy and smiled. Slowly. "Ten."

"Why?" Now it was Izzy's turn to be nervous. He couldn't quite figure out what was going on.

Almost without warning Izzy's laptop went dead. He tried rebooting.

User root does not exist.

"Izzy, in return for every piece of hard evidence you have, I will return your missing files."

Izzy was shocked. She beat him without even trying. He turned to Matt and Tai. Both were glancing back and forth from him to Reliana. I'm never going to live this down.

"I'll see you in a few hours, Izzy. Matt, Tai, did you want to take some of those cookies home with you? I made lots."

The boys preceded Reliana to the door. Matt and Tai were a little awed by this slip of a girl who beat Izzy at his own game. Not many people were better than Izzy at computers.

Closing the door behind the boys Reliana gave a sigh of relief. For a minute there she thought things were going to get a mite testy. Anyway, the situation was resolved and hopefully Izzy would forgive her soon enough for her to make it up to him. I mean, who gets over a crush that quickly, anyway?