They called it the V9.42 — a neat string of letters and numbers that promised a little more freedom than most devices ever offered. On a rainy evening in a city that never slept, Mira sat hunched over her desk, the glow of her laptop painting her fingers in pale light. She’d been searching for a solution for weeks: a way to coax her old Huawei modem back into usefulness after the carrier’s lock had turned it into a single-purpose brick.