Shel nodded.

“Where are the signals being sent?”

“To the University of Tokyo, which is where the authors of that paper work.”

“But we can’t view the images she’s sending?”

Shel displayed the hex dump once more. “Not yet. We’d need someone to write a program to render it in a computer-graphics format.”

“Are the algorithms in that journal article?”

“Yes. They’re wicked complex, but they’re there.”

Tony frowned. It was interesting from a technical point of view, certainly, but there was no obvious security threat. “Maybe if somebody in Donnelly’s group has time, but…”

“No, no, that’s not all, Tony. It’s not just going to the University of Tokyo. It’s being intercepted and copied in transit.”

“Intercepted by who?”

“I’m not sure. But whoever’s doing it has also repeatedly sent data back to the girl, also encoded visually. In other words, the two of them are exchanging encoded information.”

“Who’s the other party?”

“That’s just the thing. I don’t know. Traceback isn’t working, and Wireshark is unable to determine the destination IP address.”

A whole list of techniques one might try ran through Tony’s head—but all of them would have occurred to Shel, too. The younger man went on: “The intercepted data just disappears, and the data being sent to the girl sort of… materializes out of thin air.”

Tony felt his eyebrows go up. He knew better than to say, “That’s impossible.” The Internet was a complex system of systems, with many emergent properties and unexpected quirks—not to mention all sorts of entities trying to do things clandestinely with it. If there were data being manipulated on the Web in a way Shelton Halleck couldn’t fathom, that was of real concern.

“The kid is how old?” Tony asked.

“Just about to turn sixteen.”