Electron, still logged in as the mystery Guest, leaped in. `Did it work?'
`No. Decrypted OK, but the file was corrupted when I tried to decompress it.'
`Arghhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!' Gandalf exclaimed.
`Fuckfuckfuck,' Electron wrote. `Doomed to fail.'
`Sigh Sigh Sigh,' Pad typed.
Gandalf and Electron quizzed Phoenix in detail about each command he had used, but in the end there seemed only one hope. Move a copy of the decryption program to the JANET computer in the UK and try decrypting and uncompressing Deszip there.
Phoenix gave Gandalf a copy of Crypt and the British hacker went to work on the JANET computer. A little later he rendezvoused on Altos again.
Phoenix was beside himself by this stage. `Gand! Work???'
`Well, I decrypted it using the program you gave me …'
`And And And???' Electron was practically jumping out of his seat at his computer.