Bodie Kills the Internet

Solder smoke curled up from the workbench, a common scene for 12 year old Bodie Cannon. Bodie called the town of Greenwood home, a hilly mashup of oaks and 7,000 people tucked behind Coyote Lake, about 60 miles south of San Francisco. A sinewy lad, Bodie was different from his peers. While they were absorbed in their screens, he spent his time reading books, tromping through the woods, building forts, digging in the dirt, growing plants, and taking things apart. His bedroom was a living machine, with exposed circuitry, pneumatics, and mechanical actuators controlling a web of drip line irrigation, feeding dozens of cuttings and saplings all over the walls. His backyard was similar, with automatic doors, feeders, and waterers on his chicken coop experiment. There was no shortage of hot glue, duct tape, or zip ties with Bodie's tinkering.

Bodie noticed subtle ways in which society had become ensnared by the web of the internet. Bodie’s parents were always busy, working online jobs that kept them glued to their laptops and smartphones. He watched as his friends sat around each other with their heads kinked down toward their little black rectangles. He thought they were more interested in their virtual lives than in the real world around them. He saw how the constant connection to the internet made people anxious and lonely despite claiming to be more "connected." Bodie began to dream of a world where people made eye contact, where they worked together with their hands, and where the digital distractions were no more. "I'm going to kill the internet." he thought to himself.

One night, Bodie stumbled upon a hidden corner of the web, a hacker forum where digital rebels shared their ideas. Here, he learned about central servers that powered the global internet infrastructure. Bodie’s clever mind began to hatch a plan—a plan to shut down the internet and revert society to simpler times.

He knew this was dangerous, even deadly. He thought of the businesses he would kill, and the feuds that would ensue. He thought of faulty traffic lights and the innocence he would destroy around the world. Bodie believed the collateral was worth the reward, but at night he was tormented by the thoughts that he might be a monster, the bad guy. And to some, he would be.

For months, Bodie prepared. He learned about the layout of the main server facilities, studied cybersecurity, and gathered the tools he would need. Every morning, he did 100 push ups next to his bed, then scrambled eggs from his chickens before he hopped on his bike, practicing evasive maneuvers and building a little singletrack through the ravine behind his house on the way to school. In the afternoons, he studied blueprints and schematics of server facilities, honing his understanding of their weaknesses. On weekends, he practiced the art of hiding in plain sight, and regularly snuck into concerts and events by mirroring staff attire and keeping a low profile. By night, he delved into coding, creating sophisticated viruses and testing them on old computers he “borrowed” from his school’s dusty storage bins from one of his midnight raids.

Despite his meticulous preparations, Bodie’s first attempt to kill the internet ended in failure. Under the guise of traveling to the bay area to score a good deal on a bicycle, his dad bought him a train ticket to San Jose. Bodie walked to a funky thrift store and bought the only bike in there, a black Specialized hardrock with 26” wheels from the 1990’s that looked like it had never left the garage. This thing was mint.

He pedaled the vintage mountain bike with its triple-front sprocket drivetrain to 1 Hacker Wy in Menlo Park. His confidence slipped as he infiltrated the building. He realized that he had underestimated the complexity of the security systems. Alarms blared and he barely escaped, his heart pounding with the knowledge that he had been unprepared. He slipped his bike down the boardwalks back to the train station and boogied home to Greenwood, worried that he would be stopped as the train doors opened, but nothing came of it.

When Bodie returned to Greenwood with his new old bike, his resolve strengthened. He began another round of training, this time with greater intensity. He met a greasy, kind, reclusive hacker who lived on the outskirts of town named Glitch, a nerd of unfailing allegiance to the foil hat gang. Together they typed up advanced experimental code, bypassed security systems, and hacked servers at major corporations, learning to cover their tracks. They refined their coding skills and created a virus that could not only disable one server but would also endlessly replicate itself into any server that was online.

Months later, Bodie was ready for his second attempt at Facebook HQ. After noticing some school buses offloading kids on a field trip, he barely blended in with the mob of students as they were ushered inside, and slipped into the maintenance closet near the bathrooms, which he knew gained him access to the next set of buildings. His disguise was imperfect, but he moved through the buildings with purpose, his heart steady as he approached the server room. He used a utilities shaft, a small hallway with plumbing and electrical that connected most of the architecture of the campus, to mouse his way to the server room. He had been staring at these blueprints for months. 

Inside, Bodie quickly accessed a terminal, uploading his virus. The code was designed to spread rapidly, infecting connected systems and triggering similar viruses in other main servers across the country. As the virus took hold, the lights flickered, and the hum of the servers grew erratic with static popping and sizzling. It started to smell like hot plastic as Bodie slipped out, his escape aided and masked by the urgent evacuation.

The immediate fallout was catastrophic. The internet went dark, throwing the world into disarray. Businesses halted, Airports turned apocalyptic as communication networks crumbled, and society, heavily reliant on digital infrastructure, teetered on the brink of collapse. It took Bodie 2 days to get home, and he saw many horrors of his mutiny. He made it back to Greenwood gaunt and scuffed from narrow escapes from dangerous and desperate people. His parents hugged him and wept as their community panicked. Bodie said nothing.

People were forced to adapt quickly. At first, there was panic and confusion, but slowly, something remarkable began to happen. Without the internet, people started to look to each other for support. Neighbors who had never spoken before began to collaborate. The local doctor, who had once relied on telemedicine, now made house calls. An amateur cobbler, whose skills had been nearly forgotten in the age of online shopping, became essential as people needed their shoes repaired rather than replaced.

As days turned into weeks, Greenwood transformed. People rediscovered the value of physical skills and trades. Blacksmiths, carpenters and farmers found their expertise in high demand. The community became more self-reliant, more interconnected in meaningful ways. The constant noise of notifications and updates was replaced by the sound of laughter, conversation, and the rhythm of tools.

Bodie watched with a mixture of pride and humility as his town adapted. He saw the importance of genuine connections, the joy of shared labor, and the strength of a community bound by mutual support and respect. He also saw his neighbor’s wake from a fatal multi-car pileup the day the grid went dark. He had succeeded in his mission, not through violence or coercion, but by giving people the opportunity to remember what it meant to be human. But there were still violent consequences of his success, and his conscience was always heavy after that day.

One sunny afternoon, Bodie found himself again bent over in his neighborhood garden. They used city equipment to turn a big irrigated lawn of the local park into a plethora of potatoes, beans, and sprawling vines of different squashes and melons. The garden was a vibrant tapestry of life, with rows of juicy tomatoes, plump mushrooms, and fragrant herbs. Neighbors worked side by side, planting and harvesting crops. 

That evening, as the sun stretched the shadows and turned everything golden, there were no cell phones in sight. In the center of the park, a large hog raised by the neighbor roasted over the coals, its savory aroma mingling with the scent of herbs.

As the sun began to set, the community feasted. They celebrated their resilience and newfound unity. The tables were laden. Bodie’s mouth watered as he saw the golden-brown hog being carved, its meat tender and succulent.

Bodie looked around at the faces of his friends and neighbors, knowing that they were building a future together, one that honored the past while embracing the skills and connections that truly mattered. The digital world had fallen, but in its place, something far more precious had risen. As he shared a meal with his community, Bodie knew that this was just the beginning of a new and better way of life.