04x09 - Code + Artemis + Nuclear + N3mesis

[bunniefuu]

Angus.

I'm Auntie Gwen.

_

James, did you tell your son about File 47?

47 is a hypothetical plan to initiate a series of natural disasters that would plunge the world into chaos.

This is a reset switch.

A reset switch. Dad.

Someone's got to slow them down.

I'll set off the expl*si*n manually.

Hey.

Um, I invited some random people over.

Hope you don't mind.

Hey, guys.

So I'd just rescued a dog, and I told your dad that I was trying to come up with a name.

I didn't even think that he was listening to me, but then he calls me at 2:00 in morning, "Matty, you have to name the dog Gus.

Research shows that dogs respond to hard consonants because they create energy across more frequencies".

Then he hung up.

So, did you name him Gus?

No. I named him Jim.

To Oversight. To James MacGyver.

To James MacGyver.

Wait, you guys know the one about Bozer and Oversight's bathroom, right? What?

Riley, nobody wants to hear that.

False. I absolutely want to hear about that.

Hey.

In Vietnam, when someone dies, we say, "Chia buon", which means "To divide your sadness".

So, maybe let me take some of it on, too?

Thanks, but I don't really have time to be sad.

Well, Mac, you have to give yourself... Codex is still out there.

You're worried about File 47.

My mother was convinced that the only way to save the planet was to wipe out a quarter of the world's population, and now my aunt, the last family I have left, is trying to put that plan into action.

There's got to be a way. A way for what?

To save everyone.

Uh, hey, Mac.

Probably one of Mac's experiments.

Mac, what'd you do now?

No, it wasn't me this time, I swear.

Uh...

L.A. forget to pay its electric bill?

The city's power grid has just been hacked.

Guess that means I'm up.

Okay. Bozer, you're with me.

The rest of you, get Riley downtown.

Yeah.

Leonard Hawkes, Incident Commander.

Everybody's here.

DWP, Police, Fire, Transpo, even those chuckleheads from Sanitation.

Welcome to the suck.

How widespread is the outage?

You can drive from Santa Monica up to Palmdale without hitting a light. The whole county?

Hospitals and the like are on backup generators, but that won't last forever.

45 minutes with no power, and we got looting, traffic accidents, fires, you name it, and there's that.

Ransomware.

They're holding the city's power grid hostage.

Whoever's behind this wants 12 million bucks in Bitcoin to unfreeze everything.

Any chance that the city will pay? Definitely not.

Paying the ransom just goes to encourage future att*cks.

That is true. Well, it's a good thing we have someone here who can stop the ransomware.

Matty Webber mentioned that.

So, which one of you is the convicted felon?

Convicted.

Wait, you're the hacker? Yes, sir.

You did time? Yes, sir.

You are not... You know what?

I'm gonna stop you right there.

Because in the time it took you to ask me dumb questions, there were, like, five more traffic accidents.

You want the power back on or not?

What the... ?

My techs were trying to get past that screen for hours.

The malware looks like it's phoning home to a command and control server we'll never find, so our next best chance is...

No, that's impossible.

No way.

What is Nemesis? What is that?

It's the name of a notorious code.

They used it to shut down the grid.

Wait, you've seen this before?

Yeah.

I wrote it.

_

_

You know what? I think they're so cute.

No. It's just like a wonton.

I don't want to think about it.

You should think about it. I don't want...

Ladies.

Eat it. It's weird that you're trying to feed me.

Children.

I've gathered you here today

'cause I decided to field-test our little code.

Hmm.

Wait, do you mean Nemesis?

Because that was supposed to just be an intellectual exercise.

Tell that to the ATM across the street.

You're my hero.

This is gonna be awesome.

Oh, come on, Peyton, you put in six months of late nights working on this badass code.

It's time to see it in action.

Right?

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

_

It pinged the host processor.

It freaking works.

I have sent dozens of e-mails warning them about these zero-day vulnerabilities.

E-mails.

God, you are so boring. Okay, just, here, give me this.

Take it away.

No way.

Nice.

If you really want to get their attention, you got to think big.

Kai.

"Time to kick things up a notch".

Oh, my God! Wait, what?!

Oh! Riley, what are you doing?

The only way they'll fix the problem is if you show them they have something to lose.

That's stealing.

I like to think of it as getting paid for doing our civic duty.

Mm-hmm. That's chump change to those multibillion-dollar corporations.

Do you guys fully grasp what Nemesis is capable of?

We agreed to use this for good.

Ugh. What does that even mean?

No. Peyton's right.

We agreed we'd be white hat hackers, the good guys.

Today was just a test. Relax.

Everything's gonna be fine.

All right, move away from the keyboard... Hold on. She's trying to help.

We never intended for it to be used like this.

Who's "we"?

Me, Peyton and...

Kai.

Is that the DWP main control center?

Yes. She launched the ransomware by physically accessing the electrical grid.

It's riskier in the short term but leaves fewer digital bread crumbs to trace.

You wrote this thing. Can't you make it go away?

Ransomware has two elements: the code that encrypts it and the master key that unlocks it.

Without that key, I can't stop this.

If I had the original source code, I could create a new one, but I destroyed mine years ago.

It's possible Kai or Peyton still have their copies.

And I'm guessing it's gonna be tough to find Kai?

If she's hiding off grid, we won't find her.

Which leaves Peyton.

I doubt she'll even talk to me.

I need to loop Matty in.

In the meantime, try not to Y2K what's left of the city.

Oh... I like him.

You all right, Mac?

There's too many people in danger.

If Codex has their way, it's gonna be this and a lot worse.

You know, you've been through a lot.

Maybe you should sit this one out.

I'm fine.

All right.

Backup generator's up.

We have power.

Now, in order to stop Kai, we need to see if your old friend Peyton still has a copy of the original source code.

We haven't spoken in years.

Heard she discovered a critical bug inside voting machines.

Sold the patch for millions.

Which she used to launch her own cybersecurity company.

I mean, I think it's cool.

She's a role model for young women in tech.

It's pretty nice to have someone to look up to.

Mmm. _

Pork buns are the only desert island food I need.

Yeah. ♪ Jingle bells swing and... ♪ For you. Mmm.

For you. ♪ Snowin' and blowin' up ♪

♪ Bushels of fun ♪

♪ Now the jingle hop has begun ♪ Artemis Jayn signature series?

These are collector's items.

"Time to kick things up a notch", baby.

Oh, yeah.

You dropped some serious coin on this. Thank you.

This is a lot of money. ♪ In the frosty air ♪ Which brings me to my next gift.

♪ What a bright time ♪

♪ It's the right time ♪

♪ To rock the night away. ♪ For months now, we've been using our code to work for the banks.

Chump change. Aren't you guys getting tired of the minor leagues?

We've been putting Nemesis to good use.

And it's boring.

Is this a red pill, blue pill situation?

'Cause I like them both.

It's a job. You guys, Nemesis is famous.

People are paying attention. Who for?

The Collective. What?

No way.

Way. Guys, we made this program to expose vulnerabilities.

To make the world a safer place.

Not for profit.

It's not about the money.

Okay, yeah. The money's amazing, but this is The Collective!

This is bigger than Anonymous.

You guys, this is the big leagues.

It's our time to step up.

When do we start?

I have to think about this.

Look. Peyton, I-I know you want to believe this is white hats versus black hats, but what if I told you there's a whole amazing, complicated world out there that's just... gray?

Do you trust me?

Hey. Thanks for coming.

This is about Kai, isn't it?

Yeah, she hacked the power grid.

She's out of control.

Yeah. So... how was prison?

There was a lot of time to reflect... about how everything went down.

These people... Phoenix, they... they took me in.

Gave me a chance to use my skills for good.

The way you always wanted me to.

Well... looks like you traded in one family for another.

I thought you'd be better off without me.

And look at you.

Look at everything you've accomplished.

For what it's worth...

I'm really proud of you.

Maybe when all this is over, we can get some dumplings?

Oh.

I hate dumplings.

The source code for Nemesis.

Time to get to work.

Nice.

Sure beats sitting in L.A. traffic.

I used the source code to create a new master key that should unlock the ransomware.

Only downside is, it has to be physically plugged into each power facility, so we got to do this one at a time.

Well, Hawkes told us to start here.

This will get power to the most people the quickest.

Hi.

Phil Lasky, lead S.R.O.

I hear you can connect us to the grid.

Yes. From your lips to her ears.

Uh, thanks.

Well, you're operating in critical hot standby mode?

Oh, you know your stuff.

When we got locked out of the city's power grid, as a safety precaution, I immediately tripped the reactor and dropped the control rods.

Control rods?

You could think of the control rods like the brakes on a car.

When they're dropped, the engine idles.

Take them out, it's like hitting the gas.

Exactly. You a nuclear physicist?

No. It's just a hobby.

Ah.

Okay. We're ready.

But once I execute the file to reconnect the plant to the grid, the network will reboot.

So nobody panic.

Okay.

It worked.

Our main generator is parallel to the grid.

All right. Oliver, Peters, withdraw control rods three steps at a time until the reaction's critical, and then raise power to 15%.

We've got a lot of toasters to turn on, people.

_

Let there be light.

Excellent work, Riley.

All right, let's go. Hawkes says our next stop is the Keswick Dam.

He also called me a horse's ass for no reason.

Really digging the guy.

Peters. I said slow with the control rods.

The reaction's accelerating way too fast.

It's not us.

The system isn't responding.

It's blowing past all the reactor trips.

The rods are pulling up on their own.

Looks like Reactor One's coolant pumps are shutting down.

There's no water pumping through the core.

What the hell's going on here?

Looks like your system's gone a little bit bonkers here.

Or maybe it's Kai.

When the system rebooted, the firewall went down.

The plant was vulnerable, but just for a fraction of a second.

But that's all she needed to take control.

The ransomware was a setup.

She knew this would be our next stop and waited for me to drop the firewall.

But... why?

The control rods are fully raised.

The reactor core's temperature's going through the roof.

_

Did Kai just cut the brakes and hit the gas? Yes.

And she's steering us right towards a nuclear meltdown.

Where are we on an evacuation plan?

The airports and train terminals aren't back on their feet yet.

As far as the roads, the blackout turned L.A.'s freeways into a parking lot, and people are getting violent, so business as usual.

Mac, how much time do we have to evacuate the city before meltdown?

Uh, it's hard to say.

I mean, the core temperature is rising fast, but not at a steady rate. It's all over the place.

And at what temperature does the core melt down?

3,270 degrees Fahrenheit.

So, uh, best guess, five or six hours.

People will never get out in time.

Once the public gets word of what's happening, panic will cost lives before a meltdown.

I'm ordering an information blackout.

News of the situation at the nuclear plant cannot get out.

Is this clear?

Crystal. Riley, how can we stop your hacker friend?

I don't know. Kai has control.

I... I just let her in. Riley...

No matter what I do, I can't get, I can't get ahead of this thing. Riley...

None of my codes are working. ♪ By yon bonnie banks ♪

♪ And by yon bonnie braes. ♪ What the hell just happened? You were spiraling.

I had to distract you using a non sequitur.

It's an old psyops trick.

Wow. Okay. Yeah, yeah.

The-There is one way to get control of the plant, but I need Kai's computer.

Like, like, in my hands. I need to find Kai.

Okay, while you're doing that, Lasky, I need your help.

We can't stop the meltdown, but maybe we can buy her some time. Taylor?

So we can hear!

Here's Reactor One's coolant pump.

Which does what exactly? Okay, think of a nuclear power plant like, uh, a really high-tech teakettle.

A fission reaction creates steam which rises, spinning a turbine, generating electricity.

This pump moves seawater through the core to keep it cool.

Well, it did until the hackers turned it off.

Right, so, to delay the meltdown, what we need to do is create a new pump, one that is separate from the plant's computer system, one that will move seawater from the ocean to the reactor's core.

O-Okay. Let's say we can.

If the water evaporates too quickly...

Yeah, the fuel casings will heat up, interact with the steam, and split the hydrogen.

And then we're dealing with a combustible gas.

As in kaboom?

As in Fukushima.

That's a bit risky. Yes, but Riley needs more time to find Kai.

This will give it to her.

All right, so what do you need? All right.

I need, uh, two Jet Skis...

Jet Skis? Yeah, I saw them in the parking lot.

I'm gonna need their blades and their motors.

Then I need a dozen firehoses, a ton of duct tape, and lots of car batteries.

All right, well, as far as his usual shopping list goes, I'd say we got off pretty lightly. Come on.

Jet Skis?

What are you doing?

What the hell?

The FBI is gonna raid this place any minute.

Why? We didn't do anyth...

I did.

The less you guys know, the better.

This is not how this works.

We are in this together.

I'm the one who got us into this.

I got us pulled into The Collective.

You guys have to go!

Kai, get her out of here. Take your rigs and go, now!

But we're-we're-we're a family.

Go! Come on!

FBI! Open up!

Peyton! This is your last chance!

Open the door!

Hands!

Hands in the air!

Riley Davis, you're under arrest for unauthorized access to the National Security Agency.

Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law.

You have the right to an attorney.

Riley.

Riley. Riley.

Any progress?

Um, there's nearly a million unique IP addresses to sort through.

Kai covered her tracks... really well.

Okay, forget about all of this tech stuff, and try to hack Kai, the person.

What do you mean?

Well, I mean, she's hiding from forensic experts and law enforcement, right?

What do you know about her that they don't?

Pork buns.

Come again?

Pork buns.

She-she was obsessed with them, she ate 'em every day.

I can cross-reference the physical locations of these IP addresses with dim sum orders from food delivery apps.

Yes, Desi!

The other end of the hose is connected to the Jet Ski in the water... is a sentence I never thought I'd say.

My guy's ready to turn it on whenever we say so.

All right, well, no time like the present.

Do it.

Hey. _

My techs say the core temp acceleration has slowed.

Nice work.

More good news.

Riley and Desi say they have a lead on Kai's location.

Yeah, that's-that's great.

What's the matter?

You're doing that looking off into the distance thing as if you've lost your horse at the Ponderosa.

Okay, so Riley said that Kai's M.O. was hacking for money, which means that she was hired by someone with deep pockets.

Someone who we know wants to cause mass destruction.

Codex. Yes.

I mean, nuclear meltdown sure seems like a page from their playbook.

Well, that's true, but they don't exactly have the market cornered.

It could be t*rrorists, hostile governments, anyone.

I'm telling you, Russ, something's happening here.

And we need to be ready for it.

Are you sure this is the place?

It's a crazy amount of bandwidth considering we're in the middle of a blackout.

Not to mention those.

So, where's Kai?

Get down!

Riley?

I know. We have a lot to talk about, but right now I need your laptop so I can stop the meltdown.

What meltdown?

Look, we already know you used Nemesis to own the grid and then took control of the San Eurosia Nuclear Power Plant.

I didn't do anything to a reactor.

I got paid to hack into the DWP. That's it.

You know, we don't have time for this.

I'm telling the truth!

Riley, look at me.

Then we need a name, Kai, now.

I can't give you one. Riley...

No, I... I can't give you one because I don't know.

It was through a Dark Web protocol.

Whoever it was made sure they'd never be found.

That was Desi. They've hit a dead end.

Well, at least it's slowed down, thanks to your Jet Ski pump.

Yeah, but not slow enough.

In less than an hour, this reactor is gonna have its own chapter in the history books.

Where's Lasky?

Uh, he was here just a minute...

Mac?

What do we do?

What's the call?

We're going to alert FEMA and the NRC that there's a radiological emergency.

They'll set up a 50-mile EPZ around the reactor.

We're giving up?

No. But if we can't stop it, we have to save as many lives as we can.

It was a blast hanging with you and Peyton for a while, but nothing lasts forever.

Oh, come on, Kai. It was more than that.

I'm not a white hat hacker, Riley.

I do it for the money.

I do it for the thrill.

I think you know what that's like.

That's not who I am anymore.

Sure.

Matty's calling FEMA.

They've slowed it down, but they can't stop it.

Four million people.

Four million? What do you mean four million?

They're all gonna die?

It's a nuclear meltdown in one of the most populated cities in the country.

Yeah, we're all gonna die.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. I didn't sign up for an Armageddon.

Oh... okay, so, look.

I... I might have done something you told me to never do.

I left a bread crumb in the code.

Actually, an Evercookie.

Are you serious?

In my payment receipt, I can ping an IMEI number.

All I got was "cookie".

Whoever's behind this, I can trace their cell phone.

Mac!

What happened? This seam ruptured.

Hand me the duct tape.

What is it?

Not here. Come on.

The pump was sabotaged.

What? You don't know that.

The tape could have loosened from the pressure.

Do I really have to spell this out for you?

Kai said she was hired by an anonymous group, and Codex always has someone on the inside.

Is it possible? Yes.

Or you could just be jumping to conclusions.

How could you, of all people, be so blind?

Because this isn't your instinct talking, nor your experience nor your logic. This is trauma.

Oh, spare me. Isn't there some sort of taboo in psyops against analyzing your coworkers 24-7?

I am trying to talk to you as a friend.

Instead of taking even one second to deal with your father's death, you're putting all your energies into some sort of Codex paranoia.

I am trying to help you, Angus. You want to be helpful?

Why don't you keep an eye on the pump?

I'll go find our saboteur.

Someone over there has the laptop with control of the nuclear plant.

Okay. We going in g*ns blazing or ninja style?

Not knowing what we're up against, my vote's for ninjas.

Let's go.

Wait, you're just gonna leave me?

What if... We fail and you die along with the rest of us in a nuclear meltdown that you helped cause?

Kick some ass.

You have to stop calling me here.

All right. Let's get everything loaded up ASAP.

Almost ready.

There's the laptop.

I told you, this isn't smart.

I'm gonna get caught.

I promise to call when I know more.

I have to get back before I'm missed.

How could you do that? I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I had no choice.

Sabotaging that pump means millions of lives are on your hands!

Stop right there.

What? Sabotage?

You really think Codex is gonna save the world by destroying it?

Codex? What? I-I don't know what that is.

I was on the phone with my wife.

I know there was an information blackout, but I have to get my kids out. I just have to.

Phil? Phil, are you there?

Peyton?

I don't understand.

I'm only trying to make the world safe.

It's "time to kick things up a notch".

I'm sorry.

It's the hydrogen sensor.

Is this the thing we talked about earlier but decided to deal with later?

If we don't expunge the hydrogen from the core, the containment wall will blow and spray a radioactive cloud over all of Southern California.

Lasky, I'm sorry. I think you should call your wife back.

I'll do it later.

Please, I think you should do it now.

Get everyone out.

Take the truck. We're running out of time.

I won't be long.

This isn't you.

You don't see the big picture yet, but this is just like before.

I'm doing my civic duty.

It's the only way to save the world.

By endangering lives?

Can't get hold of Desi or Riley.

What do we do? We believe that they'll come through, and the moment that they do, we drop the control rods and turn on the coolant pumps.

As long as that gauge doesn't hit 3,270, we can stop the meltdown.

Don't we still have the problem of too much hydrogen in the core leading to a deadly radioactive expl*si*n?

Thanks for the reminder, Debbie Downer.

Yes, well, I'm British. We're taught from a very early age to be disappointed.

Wait a second. What-what if we open the valves and flood nitrogen gas into the reactor?

Which would expunge the hydrogen and prevent an expl*si*n.

Exactly. I'll go. Wait!

Nobody knows this plant better than me. Yeah, but, Lasky, you have a family. I'm not letting you go.

If I'm putting my kids' lives in someone's hands, it's gonna be mine.

Well, it's up to Riley now.

This country's cybersecurity is pathetic.

I saw it first with Nemesis.

A couple lines of code, and the whole world comes crashing down.

But then I remembered, the only way to fix the problem is to...

Show them they have something to lose.

When the world sees what happens here today, they will finally understand what needs to be done.

You know, when I started working at Phoenix, I felt really lucky I'd been given a second chance to be more like you.

Meanwhile, here I was thinking Riley Davis was right all along.

The world is just shades of gray.

It's done.

And there's nothing you can do to stop it.

Up against the car.

We've got about two minutes until meltdown.

The guts are still running.

She only hit the screen.

Here goes everything.

We have control of the system.

Engage M5-10.

Let's take it into hot standby mode.

What's going on? They're, uh, starting the reactor coolant pumps and inserting the control rods to lower the core temperature.

She did it.

What's wrong? Hit the scram button.

There's a built-in safety measure.

Lowering the control rods at this temperature will seal the reactor room door. And Lasky will be trapped.

Well, just let him out after you save the city.

No, no, no, a part of the by-product of the interaction between hydrogen and nitrogen is all the oxygen gets sucked out of the room.

If we close the doors, Lasky will suffocate.

Well, I'm gonna go get him. No, no, no, there's no time. Look.

It's him, or it's the city.

What do I do?

We can't save everyone.

Reactor room doors are sealed.

Control rods are down.

Core temp holding steady.

Now dropping.

I'm getting green lights.

It's over.

I made the call to Lasky's family.

Took care of all the arrangements.

They'll be looked after, but, of course, nothing will ever be enough.

Any word from Angus?

He hasn't responded to any texts or calls.

Well, if there's any silver lining, I just got word from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

They're overhauling security at every one of their nuclear plants in the country.

I was expecting more of a medal than a jail cell.

I did help save the city, after all.

My boss has some pull. I'll make sure they take that into consideration at sentencing.

And if Phoenix happens to have another one of those pardons lying around, I'd gladly accept.

If I hadn't insisted we get involved with The Collective, you two wouldn't be on the wrong side of this glass.

Okay, cool it with the whole butterfly effect thing.

These were my choices, and I'm prepared to face the consequences.

But I need your help with one thing.

I need you to smuggle something in here for me.

Two orders barbecue pork buns?

Anything for my sis.

You, uh... you don't lock your door anymore?

World's ending. Haven't you heard?

What if it's true?

What if we can't save everyone?

We'll, uh...

We'll find a way, Angus.

No one has to die.

Tell that to Lasky.

When I was nine, I took apart the engine of my dad's jeep.

When he, uh, came down for work, he said, "Well, I guess we know what you're doing for your summer".

He probably could've put it back together in a day, but he wanted me to learn.

Took me seven weeks.

He took the bus to work that whole time.

What is that?

My dad left a, a goodbye.

I've been trying to for days, but I just can't bring myself to watch it.

Why not?

Because it's all I've got left.

Once I watch this, then, uh, he's gone forever.

He's gone, my mom's gone.

I'm all alone.

You're not alone, Angus.

I'll watch it with you. Come on.

Angus, if you're watching this, then... you know.

I wish that there was, there was more time for us, but I need you to listen to something very carefully right now.

44, eight, two, 12, 11, 75, seven, 31, 51, 77, two, 11, 38, 53, 51, 77, two, 11.

You got that, son?

Whoa.

So much for closure.