Story code: ST-001236
Part 3: The Network Log
Ms. Vance returned to the lobby carrying a printed copy of the technical assessment logs. She stood near the reception desk, her eyes scanning the sheets before looking up at Julian and Clara. “The system registered a completed, highly optimized configuration on the shared terminal,” she said, her voice even. “But the final state submitted was incomplete and broken. Julian, your terminal log shows the database lock-up was resolved in under ninety seconds, followed by a manual wipe of the command history.”
Julian rubbed his neck, his shoulders slumping. “I must have hit a hotkey sequence. Like I said, I struggle with this local environment. It must have auto-compiled some cache. Clara, did you set up a macro on my station before we started?”
Clara looked up from her chair, her face pale. “I didn’t touch your terminal, Julian.”
“Well, someone did,” Julian said, looking back at Ms. Vance with a self-deprecating smile. “I’m just a layout guy. If the system glitched and ran some background script, that’s on the lobby hardware, isn’t it?”
I tapped my keyboard, pulling up the router DHCP table on the reception monitor. In the first few minutes of their arrival, I had watched Julian type on his phone, and now the system logs showed the exact timeline. The lobby guest Wi-Fi portal recorded every connected MAC address. At 10:14 AM-exactly when Clara had been down the hall with security-an outbound SMTP connection had been established from Julian’s registered device. The destination was Vanguard’s external recruitment inbox.
“Ms. Vance,” I said, pointing to the screen. “We have a security flag on the guest network. An external reference email for Clara Vance was routed through our local access point ten minutes ago.”
Ms. Vance walked over to my desk, leaning over the counter to look at the network log.
“The sender IP matches the device currently registered to Julian’s guest pass,” I continued, highlighting the line of code. “It was sent from the lobby.”
Clara stood up, her portfolio slipping slightly in her grip. She looked at Julian, then at the reception screen.
Julian’s smile remained, but his jaw muscles tightened. He reached into his pocket and slowly pulled out his phone, his thumb hovering over the screen. “There’s obviously a network configuration error,” Julian said, his voice dropping an octave. “The lobby router is misidentifying the traffic.”
Ms. Vance took the printed sheet from my hand. “The email arrived from an address claiming to be Clara’s former manager, alleging a major data breach under her watch. But the routing path originated from our own lobby guest network, assigned to your phone’s MAC address, Julian.”
The lobby went completely quiet. Julian did not look at Clara. Instead, he stared at the screen on his phone, his thumb rapidly scrolling through a screen of text that mirrored the draft I had seen earlier. He took a step back toward the glass exit doors, his breathing shallow.