CLUE

20. STATIC

Eddy's phone rang. He put it on loudspeaker so Brett could also hear.

"Hey, I just talked to Vaishnavi. I guess she has a friend who knows coding. I'll just patch her up also."
She called her.

"Hey Vaishnavi, Brett and Eddy are on the line. Is Sid there?"
Vaishnavi tried to control her excitement.
"Hi Brett and Eddy! Sid is also here."
"Hello!" Sid said.
"Hi Vaishnavi! Bella has told us alot about you. Thank you so much for helping." Brett said.
"No problem! I would love to help!" Vaishnavi said.

"Sid, can you tell how to decode this?" Eddy asked showing the screen to Sid and Vaishnavi.
"Sure! It's binary right? With 8 numbers?"
"On the point." Brett said.
"Ok. Read me the first 8 numbers and I'll tell you if its a number or a letter."
"Ok!" Eddy and Brett said.

"01001101" Brett said.
"That's a M" Sid said.
"Ok." Eddy said.
Brett nervously typed 'M' in the password box. Eddy's eyes were locked on the screen.
Everyone was very tensed.

One green tick appeared.

Brett and Eddy sighed in relief.
"It's working!" Eddy exclaimed.
"Great!" Vaishnavi, Bella and Sid said.
They proceeded to decode the rest of the list in the same manner.

But not for long.
They managed to get an 'E' and a 'N' after 'M' in order.
And were typing on the password box.
Three ticks till now.

"01000100" Brett said.
That's when the phone line between Bella, Eddy and Brett, Vaishnavi and Sid went a bit static. All could hear each other but not very clearly.
"The letter is D" Sid said.
"B?" Brett asked.
"It's the letter D!" Sid kept shouting on the phone. But it was no use.
"Even I hear B." Eddy said.

Brett pressed the letter 'B' on the password box.
Then Eddy and Brett saw what they didn't wanted to. It sent a shiver down their spines.

A red error mark.

"Oh no......" Eddy said.
"What happened?!?!" Bella asked.
Before they could even answer the screen changed to black.
"No..not again." Brett said quietly.
"What is happening? Someone tell something!" Sid requested.
"The screen....." Brett said.
Bella hoped that the screen wasn't locked for the second time.
"It's gone. We typed the wrong letter." Eddy said.
"Oh no." Vaishnavi said.

There was silence on the phone.