At his house, the police asked him if he would agree to an interview.
`I don't think so. I'm feeling a little … under the weather at the moment,' he said. Doing a police interview would be difficult enough. Doing it drunk would be just plain dangerous.
After the police carted away the last of his hacking gear, Prime Suspect signed the official seizure forms and watched them drive off in to the night.
Returning to his bedroom, he sat down, distracted, and tried to gather his thoughts. Then he remembered the dope. He opened his desk drawer. It was still there. Funny people, these feds.
Then again, maybe it made sense. Why would they bother with some tiny amount of dope that was hardly worth the paperwork? His nervousness over a couple of joints must have seemed laughable to the feds. They had just seized enough evidence of hacking to lock him up for years, depending on the judge, and here he was sweating about a thimbleful of marijuana which might land him a $100 fine.
As the late spring night began to cool down, Prime Suspect wondered whether the AFP had raided Mendax and Trax.
At the party, before the police had shown up, he had tried to ring Mendax. From his mother's description when she called him, it sounded as if the entire federal police force was in his house at that moment. Which could mean that only one other IS hacker had gone down at the same time. Unless he was the last to be raided, Mendax or Trax might still be unaware of what was happening.
As he waited for the police to pick him up, a very drunk Prime Suspect tried to ring Mendax again. Busy. He tried again. And again. The maddening buzz of an engaged signal only made Prime Suspect more nervous.
There was no way to get through, no way to warn him.
Prime Suspect wondered whether the police had actually shown up at Mendax's and whether, if he had been able to get through, his phone call would have made any difference at all.