16963/Young Avengers: Lizard League - Cyber Infiltration

Young Avengers: Lizard League - Cyber Infiltration
Date of Scene:	19 January 2024
Location:	Cyberspace - Communications Network
Synopsis:	Vivian infiltrates the Lizard League mainframe ahead of the Young Avengers' assault and sets it up for mayhem.
Cast of Characters:	Mark Grayson, Vivian Vision

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Mark Grayson has posed:
When the Lizard League was created some twenty-odd years ago (back in Omni-Man's time), it was a time when Telecommunications was a lot different than it is now. But when it's tried, true, and solid state, one seems to stick with it and build on it. Vivian's search of the various communications around the world will eventually connect with a communication from Mondo Dragon back to the League's Headquarters off the coast of the United States. It's an old telecomm system from one of the boom-and-bust companies of the late 90s that the Lizard League has taken for their own.

It's antiquated, by Vivian's standards, which may prove to be a problem if she's too advanced for it. The communications network will lead to a firewall - which is where Vivian will find herself now, a large partition between the Lizard League's mainframe and the rest of the network, where all communications are routed. And she'll notice immediately that there is not just one communication hub. There's several. But they're not servers, at least not in the clincal sense of the word.

They're workstations, each of them manned by someone working at them, listed as Tele-Lizard and a number. There's no computer to computer interface - it's all computer input to server. Probably not a challenge.

Vivian Vision has posed:
With many of the team's she's involved in being more re-active in nature, stopping a villains schemes once they reveal themselves to be up to no good, it's rare that Vivian Vision gets involved in pro-active virtual crime fighting. Outside of intercepting communications publicly available on social media and leaving tip-offs for the police to stop people/arms/drug smuggling rings. So the young synthezoid doesn't really have a dedicated space for such things.

Instead she's chosen to carry out todays operation from the comfort of her own apartment. Some classical music playing, a comfortable couch, and a large shallow mug of tea (not for drinking purely for the pleasing aroma).

With her body comfortable and distraction free her mind is able to focus fully on the task at hand. She portions her mind into a neat hundred subdivisions, arranged around her 'core' self like an orchestra in an orchestra pit, and summons up a baton. It's not really /necessary/ to control her subdivisions that way. But in the privacy of her own mind who is going to tell her off?

With her target located she considers her approach. Devoting the equivalent of twenty Human minds worth of herself to learning everything about the original site and communications equipment. The rest she sets to work with what she considers basic operational security.

In a way it doesn't matter how advanced Vivian herself is. She spreads her subdivisions across half the planet. Some even connecting into communications satellites in orbit. Once they've found systems vulnerable to infiltration she bounces herself across the world wide web. Weaving a pattern so complex that anyone trying to back trace her infiltration will never stand a chance of locating her origin point. It also means she can carry out her assault from systems which will be most optimally compatible!

Her actual infiltration of the Lizard League itself is painfully slow to a Human mind. Looking for any monitoring systems that might alert the villains to increased network traffic or power use. Subverting them one by one. Like taking out the physical sentries in a base. Except in this case those 'sentries' will report back that everything is running wonderfully. Nothing to see here!

Each workstation gets studied. Checking for logs and stored data. As well as basic functions and connected systems.

Mark Grayson has posed:
The workstations have been /busy/. There has been recall notices that have been sent out to active agents across the world. They are all to return to the island for some sort of ceremony, but there is precious little that is being said on what exactly that is, at least amongst the general rank and file.

However, as one goes higher up the chain of command, Vivian will start to see a transcript between the highest levels. Apparently, King Lizard is being blamed for a lot of the current failures of the Lizard League. Idiotic attacks on the Statue of Liberty, an attempted hijacking of a cruise ship... Queen Lizard has grown tired of her husband's antics and there is a project hidden behind a password protected partition.

There is also the most recent updates to the island's defenses, patrol routes, the automated systems recieving a full firmware update for the anti-aircraft weaponry on the base itself. Apparently they were spooked when a pair of Supers showed up on the island back in the summer and they went undetected until they left.

There are more sensors, more camera feeds. Vivian is able to subvert them, to throw them into a loop where they just keep showing the same thing over and over again.

In the island base, one of the Tele-Lizards notices something, and she taps at her screen. Maybe it was a dead pixel. It might be something else though. She starts to run a scan on her computer, throwing the first true obstacle into Vivian's way - and a chance to avoid the scan and get in behind it, perhaps.

Vivian Vision has posed:
Codenames and recall notes might not be immediately useful, outside of confirming the data Invincible & Prisma provided, but it's all /useful/. Knowing where agents were recalled from gives a picture as to the groups world wide operations network. Agents typically don't sit around doing nothing. So anywhere a recall takes place is noted for follow up investigation.

Passive observation continues for a little while at least in AI terms. As she notes every update to the defence systems. The research team looking into the communications network finishes up it's background reading and begins looking into the anti-air weapons. If they're missile based they typically will have abort codes. And if she can get those? Well it'll make any assault a lot safer!

Passwords can be tricky to break, even for an advanced machine intelligence, so first she checks for any personal emails or text documents where someone was lazy enough to just save the password. If she can't find any Human/Lizard based vulnerabilities? Well then she devotes some of her selves to brute forcing it. Setting all lizard related terms as her initial priority before moving onto true random passwords.

She doesn't really need to loop cameras just yet. Because she isn't there in person. But she does record plenty of footage to loop during the assault. She'll even fake some very convincing footage to feed into the system during the attack so she can make it appear like Young Avengers are anywhere she wants.

Even the best Tele-Lizard is likely limited by their organic nature. Having to type commands out manually is, in machine terms, glacially slow. By the time the scan has been triggered Vivian is already fully aware of the Tele-Lizards intended course of action and is preparing a solution. In this case a simple modification to the display drivers that lets her modify what's on the screen. So when the results come up from the scan? Well it doesn't matter what the scan says because Viv controls the horizontal and the vertical. And the Tele-Lizard? Rather than say nothing at all is up Viv feeds a 'display driver update required' message. Better to give a mundane red herring cause for the problem than try to claim everything is totally perfect.

Mark Grayson has posed:
There's several locations to earmark. New York, Gotham, Baltimore, some Springfield out there somewhere. There's so many Springfields. But they are easy to mark, create a file and send it to the Young Avengers or SHIELD for future operations.

The anti-air systems seem to be a mix of heat and radar seeking missiles as well as more close-in Phalanx gatling style weapons, multi-barreled monsters that sling out thousands of shells a minute. The missiles have abort codes, those are easy to find - the cannons will take a more creative approach to deal with.

A look into Queen Lizard's email will find the answers that Vivian seeks. The password is actually her own son's name in reverse, and she's probably a fool for having a password list in her email in the first place. What Vivian discovers behind that password is different.

Apparently the wife is tired of the husband and has the science division of the Lizard League working to use DNA and genetics to create a new 'Supreme Lizard' that will be the future of the group. Not just a grown up clone of her and King Lizard's child, like the first one, but one that will borrow DNA from others to make him the ultimate leader.

That is what this whole meeting is about, Vivian may learn. Queen Lizard has recalled everyone because her plan is to usurp King Lizard, instil herself as the new leader of the Lizard League and discuss their future and what they can do now that the biggest threat to them, Omni-Man, has left the Earth. Invincible and his little group of friends in the Young Avengers? They are not considered a threat.

The Tele-Lizard gets the feedback on her display about the display driver update and she glances at it before shrugging her shoulders and sipping at her cola. Her systems, however? They give Vivian the schematics of the base - from the top level, to the gathering area, to the living quarters, armory and hangar. Every area is carefully mapped out and laid to bear for Vivian to record and set aside.

Her mission so far has gone smoothly. But this is probably easy mode for her. The Lizard League is not exactly technologically advanced, but hey, sometimes it's good to be good at what you do!

Vivian Vision has posed:
The data is all collated for later use. Viv also takes notes of every make and model of defence weapon installed, plus the specific firmware updates, then feeds that data into various international law enforcement agencies who deal with the illegal weapons trade. Looking into arms deals which have already taken place isn't really a Young Avengers sort of deal. But it could help groups like SHIELD close up a few ongoing cases.

The Phalanx systems might be harder to neutralise with codes. But they have computer control systems to aim them and if she's the one doing the aiming? Well she can fire thousands of rounds harmlessly or turn the guns against other base facilities to drive defenders away from specific locations.

It's not really nice to send rude emails about people. It is even worse to set up a timed bulk forward of said emails to the person getting shit talked. Poor King Lizard will learn all about his wife's plans, minus any useful technical data, at the same time the team are coming in to attack. Her mission is to create as much chaos and confusion as possible after all. And turning the league against itself seems like it could be very disruptive indeed.

She collates all the facility information. Building a real time tactical map using the maps and camera footage. And just to be safe she subverts all the other Tele-Lizards stations in the same way. Just to guarantee no-one will bother her during the rest of her work.

It is indeed on the easy side technically speaking. Not like the time Viv met Oracle and had to use every advantage being an AI provides just to chat on equal terms!

Once she's fully in control of the computer systems the Conductor portion of her mind smiles. "Now then me," she says with a swish of the baton. "Time to get to work."

With access to the security and email systems there is ever so much mischief she can cause. And cause it she does. Maintenance schedules are tweaked so that key craft in the hangers are being taken apart for repairs when they're needed to defend the facility. Plumbing and air conditioning systems have a statistically plausible number of malfunctions right as the base is at it's most heavily occupied. Not enough to alert anyone but enough to harm the defenders morale.

If she has access the armoury doors will lock shut just as the Young Avengers are alerted. The fewer guns the Lizard League have to fight back with the better!

As a final act of malicious sabotage she prepares a host of emails about last minute schedule changes. So as the strike team is approaching everyone will be wondering just where they should be, what they should be doing, and why Queen Lizard is insisting the cafeteria menu consist entirely of brussel sprout dishes.

Mark Grayson has posed:
As Vivian gets to work with all of the maliciousness of a teenager pulling off the greatest seinor prank ever, the Lizard League is unaware what is happening. That every system, every defense that they have carefully set up against any kind of attack has been subverted and ruined.

When Vivian is done with her attack, a Girl Scout troop could possibly take down the base. There is still the supers part of the equation to deal with, but as for the rank and file Lizard League member? They have been effectively removed from the equation.

And none of them will be the wiser until the Young Avengers launch their assault of exactly how devious an AI with too much time on her hands can be.