if i think i can figure things out, is that curiosity or arrogance?

Upon finally returning to his room after a five-day vacation, item one on Topher's agenda was to stand on the inside of the door and just have a moment of dorkish glee. He'd been on a whole other planet! And it was awesome! And he'd gotten bitten by a weird giant bug thing and seen mostly-naked girls and half-naked Ben and Ender and almost crashed Ben's speeder, but it was all on another planet so it was awesome!

Once that was taken care of, he composed himself (though he still looked a little overenthusiastic) and started unpacking. He set Kenzi's present on the dresser, tossed his clothes and the stupid, stupid poncho into their rightful places on the floor, and then shoved his luggage under his bed.

And then his room was neatly in order (you know, if you were Topher), which left him to flop down on his bed and grab his laptop.

( After almost having gotten Peter into trouble this weekend, he felt like he should look at a few things... )

[[Door is cracked, post is open. Spybots and stuff under the cut NFB, and obviously done with the permission of the marvelous lockestheway.]]

Fact: Research sucked.

But here Topher was, doing it anyway. Because Peter had told him to, and that was enough, most of the time, to get him to do things. Sad but true.

And... maybe Topher was a little bit more inclined to do as Peter said this week in particular for another reason too. Which would be the need to appease him in light of the terrifying possibility that maybe, just maybe, Karla had blabbed the contents of their conversation the other day and now Peter wanted to kill him and get a new tech person and not be his friend anymore and and and --

Anyway.

Researching.

It was hard, with the siren call of meta for Skyrim beckoning to him, but Topher was managing.

[[open door, open post]]

After spending some time over at some other campfire that was not his, Topher came back to his room to resume the activity of the week. The activity? Watching loud, obnoxious videos. Except he had to cringe and lower the volume every time he heard footsteps in the hall, because he did not want to get punched again.

Then he came upon something interesting. At first he shuddered, because, you know, boobies, but then he got a good look at the girl in the video.

"No. Way."

And then the related videos linked to something even better.

"Oh my god," he breathed.

Then he got up and scrambled out of the room. He had to gloat about this.

[['Stablishy, but open!]]

There really was nothing like a game of laser tag to put Topher in a hacking mood, he decided as he flopped down on his bed, still laser-suited-up with his pack and his blaser on. (He'd picked this equipment out for comfort; in fact, he could probably sleep in it if he had to. Not that he could think of a situation in which he would have to.) With nothing else to do and no one to bother on IM, he thought about maybe poking around some secret files. You know, just for fun. 

The server he'd been investigating for his evil overlord Peter had kicked him out... so maybe it was time for another go.

Before long, he was back clicking through IF files. Ah, laser tag and hacking. Throw in some horrible island craziness that would upset everyone and it would be a perfect day.

[[Open for IMs and visitors! Exactly what files he's poking through is NFB, but the rest is for your broadcasting pleasure!]]

Topher was pretty sure that he was right on the verge of breaking into the files Peter had wanted. He'd spent most of the past week working on it, not to mention today's computer class, and while the files were pretty tough to crack, he knew he'd get it eventually. Come on. He was a genius. Just a few clicks... and... bingo. He was in.

Just what he was in wasn't quite clear. There was a list of names with files on each of them. He clicked on A. Wiggin, not really sure what to expect, and found things like "Command School" and "further education." What? The rest of it was fairly vague, so he went back to look at some other names. This A. Wiggin, whoever he was, was younger than most of them, but other than that, he was just starting to piece everything together when --

Crap. All of a sudden he was locked out of the server, and while he made a few attempts to get back in, he had a feeling it was probably permanent. Ah, well. Hopefully he would have what Peter needed. He took out his phone and sent him a text that just read Got it.

A man of few words, Topher was.

[[For the manipulative brain twin. Conversation and details of what Topher did are NFB, please.]]