Next, he made the Mexican responsible for the hidden cameras his crew installed in the women’s locker and shower rooms at the Olympic Club. He put the videos on the Flaherty & Associates network when he hacked their system.
Mr. Higuera, you pervert. When they find these records, they will know you are a menace to society.
Finally, he slipped the source code to the CryBaby virus into Higuera’s source code control system. It would appear as if the infidel had worked long and hard to perfect the virus.
Days earlier, Assad had opened an account at the Grand Cayman National Bank in Higuera’s name. It was time to fill it.
He hacked into Wells Fargo and Bank of America, then moved large sums of money to Higuera’s account. He hid the transaction well enough that the average auditor would miss it, but the super-sleuths at the NSA were sure to pick up the trail.
Goodbye, Mr. Higuera. You were a worthy adversary.
****.
Ted awoke to the sound of pounding on his door. He looked at the clock. Two a.m. What the hell? Throwing a robe over his boxers and T-shirt, he pulled the nine-millimeter Glock from the drawer in his bedside table and lurched towards the door.
He looked through the peep hole.
Abiba!
He threw open the door. “What the hell are you doin’ here at this time of night?”
“Mr. Ted, I have to talk to you,” she said. Her normal cultured British accent was slurred with fear.
Ted stepped back to let her in. She wore an unbuttoned coat over a sheer night-gown; it left little to the imagination. She’s not dressed for making social calls.
She breathed heavily after running from the parking lot and up the stairs to Ted’s apartment. “Mr. Ted, I know who is launching these attacks.”
“Sit down, Abiba.” Ted motioned towards the black leather couch. “Can I get you somethin’?”
“Water, please.”
Ted took a few steps to his kitchen and pulled a Britta pitcher out of the fridge.
Ted handed her a glass of water, then sat on the matching recliner at right angles to the couch. “Now, what’s this all about? What gets you out of bed at two in the mornin’?”
Abiba gulped a drink of water between gasps for breath. “It came to me in a dream. I know who is causing all the trouble. He calls himself the Lion of God.”
“Uh … Okay, who is he? Where do I find him?”
“You already know him, Mr. Ted.” Abiba’s breathing slowed down. “He is the husband of the woman we rescued the other day. His name is Samir Hussaini.”
Ted scratched his chin. “Okay, I suppose it might make sense. When I met him, he seemed like a decent American citizen, but Mary Beth tells me he’s mad at America. He certainly has the technical skills to pull something like this off. No one could do this by themselves, though. He must have helpers.”
Abiba reached over and took both of Ted’s hands. “I don’t know about that, but it is he. He came to me in a dream. He talked to me and said that this was just the beginning. The West Coast was a test. Soon he will launch an attack on the whole country. He said when he was thorough, America would be back in the Stone Age and the Great Caliphate would rise.”
“Abiba, you know we can’t take a dream to the FBI. We need to have proof.”
“I don’t know about proof. I just know that it is Samir Hussaini.”
****
Assad sat at his desk in the safe house and stared into space. Hiquera. He’s the key. He knows too much. He must be stopped.
“Daaim, I need you.”
The tall, thin man came to Assad’s desk.
“Yes?”
“Can you burn a specific house or apartment?” Assad’s left little finger twitched.
Daaim considered for a moment. “If he has a newer microwave. I need to get the IP address. I suppose if I had the target’s name and ID information, I could hack the manufacturer and see if he registered his microwave. If he did, I can get it.
“Make it so. We’re looking for an infidel named Ted Higuera.”
In fifteen minutes Daaim was back at Assad’s desk. “It is too easy. The manufacturer never thought anyone would want to get at that information. There is practically no security on their system.”
“You have what you need?”
“Yes. I can start the fire immediately.”
Assad’s eyes sparkled. “Do so tonight, after Higuera has gone to sleep.”
****
“He’s coming after me because he knows we’re onto the Wall Street virus.” Ted sat in a swivel chair in the computer room, talking to Bear. “If we work hard enough, we can probably trace it back to him.”
Bear grinned. “If he comes after you, he’s going to have to go through me first.”
Ted reflected at how easily Bear had accepted Abiba’s dream unmasking the villain. Maybe he was coming around. “Okay, here’s what we have to do. We need to scour the Internet, find out every scrap of information we can about Samir Husseini.”
Bear pushed back from his workstation to look Ted in the eye. “Let’s get together after lunch to see what we’ve learned.”
Ted returned to his office and went to work. First, he used NetPI to do a thorough background search on their target. Then he did a general Google search. Next, he targeted specific networks. Schools, government records, honor societies.
The hours went by quickly.
“Mr. Ted.” Abiba’s voice came over the intercom. “It’s after noon. Do you want me to order something in for you, or are you going out?”
“Ah … Thanks, Abiba. No, I don’t have time to go out. Order me a California burrito and a Coke.”
“Yes, sir.”
It took Ted a moment to get back into dogged PI mode. Where else could he search? How about church records. Husseini was a member of a mosque in Redmond.
The mosque records didn’t reveal much. He was married there. He had two children. He was a model citizen. Crap!
Abiba returned with his lunch. It sat there, uneaten.
His phone rang. “Hi, Bear, whatcha got?”
“I’ve gone about as far as I can go. Do you want to get together and compare notes?”
“Sure.”
A moment later, Bear entered the office, lap top in hand.
“Let’s sit at the work table.” Ted stood and walked over to the table carrying his unopened burrito.
Bear sat and opened his lap top. “I’ve gone through the guy’s school records. He’s impressive. IQ must be off the charts. He got straight A’s at Harvard in computer science, then aced his master’s at MIT.”
“There’s no question he’s smart, and good, to pull of the stuff he’s been doing.”
“I’ve got his immigration documents right here. He came over on a student visa at eighteen. He met Jennifer Griswold in college and got his green card.” Bear turned his laptop so Ted could see the screen. “He moved to Seattle after he graduated from MIT. Got a job at Microsoft and quickly moved up the ladder.”
“Yeah, I got his wedding at the Redmond mosque.” Ted scratched at his head with his ink pen. “I can’t find a trace of anti-American sentiment.”
Ted looked at his friend. Bear had deep dark circles under his eyes. He looked wan and tired. “When’s the last time you got any sleep?”
“I haven’t been home in three days.”
“Shit, man. At least you could take a shower. You’re beginning to get GAPO?”
“GAPO?”
“Gorilla Arm Pit Odor.”
“Back to the subject at hand.” Bear tugged at his fiery red beard. “He’s Mr. Clean. I couldn’t find a complaint that could be traced back to him.”
“It’s almost as if he’s too perfect. Too clean. No one is that good.”
Bear leaned back in his chair. “Unless …”
“Unless?”
“Yeah, unless he was purposely trying to stay off the radar. As if he wanted to get lost in the great melting pot.”
“Are you s
aying that he’s some kind of sleeper agent? That he came over here all those years ago just to put this kind of attack in motion?”
Bear laced his fingers behind his head and looked up at the ceiling. “Think about it. Twenty years ago, we didn’t have the technology to cause this kind of damage to our economy. Sure, we had computers, but we weren’t anywhere as connected as today.”
“Okay.”
“So, what if someone sent him over here to get educated? To worm his way into our infrastructure. To find ways to hurt us. Over the years, as technology advanced, he saw his chance. He learned all he could and found a way to strike against us.”
Ted reached back to his desk to get his Coke. “So, he’s Superman. He still couldn’t have done all of this by himself. No one’s that good. How long would it take you to hack the NSA and modify their virus? How long to hack the sewer systems, the air traffic control, the cities’ traffic systems?”
“Okay, so he has a whole crew. They have to be located somewhere. They have to have an office, a place to work.”
“Right. That’s our first line of attack.” Ted wrote on his yellow pad. “We need to trace his utility records, his bank accounts. Find any way we can to locate his office.” He unwrapped this lunch and took a bite of the cold burrito.
“Next thing up,” Bear said, “is to find out how he hacked into our system. I thought our security was iron clad. How did he get around it? How did he use your IP to launch the DoD attack?”
“Third item.” Ted held up three fingers. “We need to get into his files, to see if we can find anything incriminating.”
“He works at Microsoft, Hero. They probably have better security than we have. They’re virtually unhackable. We’d need a court order to get to his files.”
Ted grinned. “Where there’s a will, there’s a way.”
****
Ted’s apartment on Capitol Hill was dark and quiet. Ted lived alone and hadn’t had time to ask anyone to look after his apartment for him.
As the clock on the microwave flipped over to 1:00 am, the machine turned itself on. It ran for several minutes.
The microwave was an over-the-stove model with a vent fan included. It sat and hummed. Smoke began to appear from the wooden cabinets around the appliance. Then the box exploded, and flames broke out in the woodwork.
It didn’t take long for the fire to spread throughout the kitchen, then leap to the living room. Oil paintings on the walls and the drapes were the first to ignite. Furniture quickly followed.
****
Abiba sat at the reception desk at Flaherty & Associates and thumbed through an old copy of People magazine. I don’t know why people are so consumed with what celebrities had for lunch or who is sleeping with who. But she didn’t put the magazine down,
The buzzer for the front door rang. She was happy with the remodel. It would take a Sherman tank to get through the door.
“Flaherty & Associates, how may I help you?” she asked into the intercom.
“FBI. We need to see Ted Higuera.”
She sat up and paid attention. On her five-inch monitor she saw an FBI badge held up to the camera.
“Uh … come on up…” She pushed the button to unlock the door.
She buzzed Ted’s office on the intercom. “Mr. Ted. You better get out here right away.”
Moments later two men in Brooks Brothers suits came through the office door.
“FBI,” the first man said in his command voice. “We have a warrant.”
“What’s this all about?” Ted asked as he approached Abiba’s desk.
“Ted Higuera, you’re under arrest for treason.”
“Treason?”
Before Ted had a chance to react, the FBI man spun him around and slapped on hand cuffs.
“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say …”
“Abiba, call Hope. Call Chris.” And then he was shoved out the door.
Abiba sat, mouth open, too stunned to react.
Mary Beth came running from her office. “Abiba, what just happened?”
“Ah … two men. Two men just took Mr. Ted.”
“Who were they?” Mary Beth’s shriek had the volume of a 747 taking off.
“Um … um … FBI. They said they were from the FBI. They showed me a badge.”
Mary Beth took a calming breath. “Why? What did they say?”
“I don’t … know. Wait. They said he was under arrest for treason.”
“Treason?” Bear came running up. “That’s all? They didn’t say anything else?”
“No, they just took him. Wait a minute, he said to call Miss Hope.”
Mary Beth reached for the phone on Abiba’s desk and dialed Hope’s number from memory.
Chapter 23
The lunch rush was busy, but Hope’s crew handled it with their usual alacrity. Her restaurant was a well-oiled machine. Hope said goodbye to a group of businessmen and headed towards the office. She stopped to pick up a cup of coffee on the way.
She sat at her chair and took a breath. She was still recovering from her injuries and hadn’t yet built up the stamina to work a full shift.
Her cell phone rang. The dial tone played “She Works Hard for the Money.”
Catrina? No one had heard from Catrina since she took off on her around-the-world trip.
“Hello, Cat!” The excitement showed in her voice. “Where are you?”
“Hope, this is Mary Beth. Something’s happened.”
Her skin felt prickly, and her body temperature went up. “Mary Beth? What are you talking about?”
“It’s Ted. The FBI just arrested Ted. He said to call you.”
All of the air went out of her lungs. “The FBI? … Why? What happened?”
“We don’t know. They just came and took him away.”
Hope was up, pacing her office floor. Her breath was fast and shallow. Her heart felt like it would burst from her chest. “FBI. Chris. I’ve got to call Chris.”
****
Assad sat at the desk in his safe house. His hair matted and reeking of sweat. He hadn’t been home in days.
As soon as the operation is over, I’ll go after my wife and kids. Nothing will stop me from getting them back. Then there’ll be hell to pay.
The ringing burner phone broke him out of his reverie. “Yes?”
“You were right. The FBI picked up Higuera today.”
Assad slapped his phone shut and shouted. “Yes! It is all coming together. With Higuera out of the way, the operation can proceed.”
****
“Ladies and gentlemen,” the voice on the TV said. “We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming to bring you this special edition of News Front with Janet Peterson.”
The scene on the TV went from The Young and Restless to the studio where News Front originated. Janet Peterson sat behind her ebony news desk.
Janet looked directly into the camera. “We’re getting breaking news in from around the country. It appears as if the United States is the victim of a full-scale cyber-attack. Our first report was of cell phones going down all over the country.”
She held up a smart phone. “There is simply no signal available. We’ve checked out the phones and they are operating properly, but every cell tower in the country is down.”
Over her shoulder, the screen showed a woman turning on a water faucet.
“Water systems are failing across the nation. It appears that the software that controls the water systems in every major city has failed. Workers are trying to restore service through manual intervention, but the systems are so automated that it may take some time.”
She held her hand to her right ear. “We have a new story coming in right now.” She was silent for a moment. “We are taking you to rural Pennsylvania for a special report.”
The picture on the screen changed to a countryside view with two trains, going in opposite directions, derailed over the quiet landscape.
“Thank you, Janet.” The camera focu
sed on a silver-haired man. “This is Tom Westmoreland coming to you live from just outside Monongahela in Washington County. At approximately one-twelve pm Eastern time a freight train collided with an Amtrak passenger train coming the other way on the same track. We don’t have a casualty count yet, but it’s massive. I’ve already seen the coroner taking away at least three body bags.”
The TV screen split with Janet on one side and Tom on the other. “Tom, do we know yet what caused the accident?”
Tom ran his hand through his luxurious silver mane. “Janet, officials are not willing to talk to the media at this point. They’ve scheduled a press conference for five pm Eastern time. In the meantime, my sources tell me that this is the result of a total collapse of the routing system. I’m getting reports from other parts of the country of incidents like this one.”
“Tom,” Janet asked, “could this be part of a nation-wide cyber-attack?”
“There’s no way to say for sure at this point, Janet, but if I had to bet, I’d put my money on a terrorist attack of some kind.”
The screen went back to one picture of Janet. “I’m getting new reports of more problems in the transportation industry. Trucks all over the country are going out of control or refusing to start. If this keeps up, the entire transportation system will shut down.”
She put her hand to her ear again.
“Now a new report from Suzanne Sullivan in Cincinnati.”
Suzanne stood in front of a huge grocery warehouse.
“Janet, we have new problems here, and from what I can understand, all over the country. Commercial refrigeration is failing. Here at the AFP distribution center, the manager tells me that all refrigeration and freezers have shut down.”
The scene shifted to stock footage of the inside of a grocery distribution warehouse with seemingly endless aisles of freezers.
“All of these commercial installations are controlled by remote companies who monitor the equipment and send out repair crews when necessary. According to the manager here, the control centers seem to have crashed.”
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