Buzzworm (A Technology Thriller): Computer virus or serial killer?

by Theo Cage

  BW didn’t like it. He hardly felt threatened, but he still didn’t like an outsider going through his personal sock drawer. And that was how BW saw the agency’s system. It was his to do as he saw fit.

  BW had several options to consider. It would be easy to fire a shot across this worm expert’s bow; wipe out his personal files for example. Or burn up his personal hard drive. He had done it before. Imagining smoke pouring out of Mr. Strange’s laptop made him smile.

  No. There was a better way though. Attack him outside of the CIA. That would divert him again, make him waste whatever time he had available. The CIA wasn’t going to give Strange unlimited time to fix the problem so the more time he wasted on dead ends, the faster he would be gone.

  BW thought about the options for a few minutes. Maybe Mr. Xavier would have to get involved. That could be interesting. Not as diverting and addictive as the undercover work Xavier was doing with Mary Ellen Duke. But interesting in a very different way.

  BW mixed another caffeine pick-me-up, another full gram of the glorious white powder blended with chocolate milk. He did this at his desk, his eyes on his monitoring screen. He was watching Strange, tracking his movements, and chug-a-lugging the gluey caffeine blend. He always knew when it was time to take another hit, when his hands stopped vibrating. Pure caffeine gave him what he called the shakies and a constant ringing in the ears. Off the stuff, he developed a migraine headache that was totally debilitating. He preferred the tremors.

  It was then that BW realized what he needed to do to Strange. His idea might get the hacker kicked out of the agency permanently. At minimum even get him seriously in trouble with the law. He would use the backdoor technology he had secretly installed on the network. The same trick he had used years ago as his new mission was just beginning to become clear to him.

  During that first week, when Buzzworm initially took control of Langley’s heating and air conditioning system, the workers in administration began suffering brutal temperature swings. Day one began sweltering, but before maintenance could arrive, he had the air conditioning cranked up to a new previously unknown maximum. People who had pulled off sweaters and jackets were now looking for plug in heaters. He played this game for a week, even drove over to Langley one afternoon to see for himself and enjoy their misery. Little was getting done in the department and the local manager was harried and angry. He actually used the f-bomb on one of the repair people; something that shocked his staff. BW gave himself his first bonus point. Pushing people to the edge was an engrossing new hobby.

  BW became fixated on a comment one of the admin staff had posted on Facebook that week. They figured the CIA was haunted. Well fine, let’s riff on that, he thought.

  The hacking community had a number of dirty little tools available to insiders, one of them known as backdooring. Backdooring was a method of sneaking into someone’s computer without them noticing and taking over control. With backdoor access, a person thousands of miles away could erase and move files, monitor what a person was typing on their keyboard and even see what they were watching on their computer monitor. But BW could go one step further. He could not only now control anyone’s computer in the system, he could also backdoor the entire CIA network so that he could play his games from any computer terminal on the planet that was connected to the Internet.

  The admin staff had an interesting day Wednesday, especially the woman who had posted the haunted office story. After taking her first sip of coffee that morning, she heard an unfamiliar sound. She then watched as the tray on her CD drive slid out. She looked at it curiously. She had never used the CD burner on her office computer and was completely unaware that it existed. She stared at it for a moment. Then it slid closed again. As soon as she touched her coffee to her lips, it whined open again. She paused. Was it waiting for something? Am I supposed to put a CD in?

  She asked the woman in the next cubicle if she was having the same problem. Her co-worker winked and suggested that her computer must be haunted too. Then the drive opened and closed several times in quick succession, the tiny gears groaning, taunting her. While this continued her computer screen flashed blue, then white. Soon the screen was acting like a migraine-inducing strobe light, flashing in syncopation with the bedeviled CD drive.

  She jumped up and ran to her supervisor who looked up at her, waiting for another room temperature report. They walked back to her cube. The computer sat quietly, her monitor displaying a blurry photo of her Chocolate lab chewing on a deflated soccer ball. The CD drive was closed and silent. She frowned.

  BW knew all of this because he had taken control of the webcams mounted on all of the employees PCs as well as the security cameras liberally mounted in offices and hallways.

  When the woman’s manager left, her computer bit her. That was how she described it to friends later. She sat down at her desk and reached for her mouse when the CD drive opened again. She swore under her breath, something she rarely did. She sneered at the little plastic tray, daring it to move again. She moved her hand toward it, expecting it to slide back into the case. She touched it carefully, her finger slipping into the round hole at its center when it suddenly slammed shut, pinching her finger painfully between the sharp plastic case and the tray. She yelped so loud her co-worked, the one who thought haunted personal computers was such a hilarious idea, spilled her coffee all over her new dress slacks.

  CHAPTER 16

  Building 213 has the most expensive security system I’ve ever seen. It puts Fort Knox to shame. And I know, because I toured it once. I’d love to know what they’re protecting here because it sure as hell isn’t gold bullion.

  Vienna set up a meeting with me and two security techs — two guys with low foreheads and no personality. We walked around most of the public areas in the building. I learned that the complex around 213 was covered by over ninety color cameras feeding into something they called a video server array. The array recorded everything — twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. All time coded. Security had the ability to order up any surveillance going back as far as five years. As well, all security card data, such as who went where in the building, was also synchronized with the video. So when you saw a person entering an elevator on the screen, which was an example they showed me, the person’s name was shown right beside them. Very slick.

  Using their array, we went back to the night Scammel died. He had a lab on level sub four, corner, no windows, and one door. There was a camera in the hall outside, but nothing inside the lab itself. They explained that was another kind of security precaution. They needed to track people’s movements, but not intrude on what might be very secretive work. So, unfortunately, his actual death went unrecorded.

  They explained that anyone coming or going through all sections of the building had to scan their security card through a card reader, to open doors and elevators. They mapped all employees in the building in real time.

  We watched as Scammel entered his room at 10:12 AM, on the day he died. He was alone. Throughout his final day he had only two visitors. At 10:47, a programmer from the video team met with him about a software problem. I knew that because I talked to the employee. He said he spent about half an hour going over a problem with a shading routine. He explained that this was part of a program that calculated shadows — their shape, size and color. He couldn’t tell me what it was used for.

  The employee thought Frank’s behavior that afternoon was BAU. Business as usual. Distracted by his work and not overly friendly, but nothing out of the ordinary. Not how you would think someone suicidal would act.

  At 3:36, Vienna dropped by. Again, recorded on video and by security log. I spoke to Jo again. We went over Scammel’s attitude that afternoon. She said he seemed like the regular Frank. A bit of a pain in the ass, but nothing unusual.

  At 5:02 Frank left his lab, recorded on video when he left the room. I watched it several times, from a camera placed outside the hall. Nothing in his body language hinted at a change in mental stat
e. You couldn’t help but notice how big he was on the video, so round he even had a bit of a waddle in him. Long hair, but no beard. Apparently they wouldn’t let him grow one. One win for the establishment.

  Frank went to the front foyer that afternoon and received a delivery from Pizza Pizza. He paid cash. One large meat lovers. I called Pizza Pizza and they said he was a regular. Always the same order. They knew that because they tracked customer preferences and purchases on their computer system.

  I didn’t tell them that Frank was dead. I wonder how long it will take for their computer to start missing him.

  Watching him lumber back to his lab with the pizza got me thinking. Did Frank bring in the Demerol himself? There was no trace of a container in the room following his death. We watched him walk from the foyer, pass through security, wait for the elevator. He talked to no one. No one could have handed him the pills.

  The Crime lab had checked his clothes. I wanted to know if he could have carried them in his pocket. Again, no trace anywhere except his right hand. It was frustrating. We could watch him on the video anywhere in the hall, the elevator or outside his door. Once he swiped in, we were in the dark.

  After the pizza pickup, he never swiped out. Ever.

  What had changed Scammel between five PM and early in the morning from a man interested in pizza to someone in a hurry to die?

  I sat in the temporary parking area outside Building 213, in my gray Vic, thinking through next steps. I had my list in front of me.

  Vienna mentioned that he had talked briefly about his daughter that last day. She said she was surprised. He almost never talked about family. I checked the birth records in the crime database. Lorilee Scammel. Seventeen. Lived with her mom in Dupont Circle. I had no other angle, so I decided to drive out there.

  I took Rock Creek Parkway north and turned on Pennsylvania. They lived in an apartment block in Foggy Bottom that needed paint and new windows. Frank’s ex-wife was not home, but Lorilee was making supper.

  She was a sullen looking girl wearing too much makeup. I asked her if her Mom would call me. She took my card. I said I was sorry about her Dad. She just shrugged. She didn’t seem too upset.

  Her mother, Katherine, called me about ten minutes after I left, so I turned around and drove back. They were both eating a pasta dish when I rang up. She invited me in. She offered me a plate, but I made an excuse, told her I had already eaten, which was a lie.

  “Sorry to bother you, Mrs. Scammel. This is just routine. I won’t be long.” She seemed more tired than anything, and as soft spoken as her daughter. She apparently had just put in ten hours at the Georgetown Best Western where she was an assistant manager.

  “Do you have any idea why Frank would commit suicide?”

  “I can’t tell you much, Detective. We’ve been split since Lorilee was twelve. I haven’t talked to him for months.”

  “How about you, Lorilee? Did you see your Dad recently?”

  Katherine answered for her. Lorilee had her head down, twirling her fork. “Lorilee never had much to do with Frank.”

  “Yeah. Teenagers. I have one myself,” I said.

  “That’s not it. She would love to have a father around. Frank wasn’t… you probably know about Frank’s run-in with the police years ago?” I nodded. “Frank had a few problems in that area. Lorilee wanted nothing to do with him after that. She’s a smart girl.”

  I watched them eat for a moment then decided they couldn’t be of any more help to me. “Sorry to bother you. I’ll let myself out.” When I stood up though, I thought of one more thing. “Mrs. Scammel, there is a very slim chance that Frank’s death wasn’t suicide.” She looked up at me, her fork suspended in the air. “We haven’t ruled out murder. Do you have any idea who might want to see him dead?”

  Lorilee answered, not taking her eyes off her plate. “Only everyone,” was all she said.

  CHAPTER 17

  Med found Roger in the server room on sub floor four, far in the back, hunched down near the floor in the dimly lit space staring at a wall of blinking lights. She always loved this space; the understated hum of high tech, the dark drama of a symphony of multicolored lights communicating their special function in a language only a chosen few could understand. She felt completely at home here.

  Roger stood up, looking distracted, the glowing wall of lights reflecting off his glasses. He was wearing a black shirt and dark jeans. She smiled thinking he looked like a modern day version of a wizard. Or a minister.

  “Are you religious?” she asked.

  Roger looked slightly amused by the question. He raised his arms to take in the room. “This is my church,” he said.

  “I know what you mean,” she answered, running her hand across the black-brushed surface of one of many blade servers stacked up by the dozens. “I just came by to see if you had made any progress on our virus.”

  Roger nodded. “You were right about there being dozens of attacks on staff. Everyone I talk to has a story. But all the trails lead nowhere. I was just doing a scan to see if there was any missing storage.”

  “Missing?”

  “One of the tricks a hacker can use is to take a chunk of hard drive space and make it invisible to the rest of the network. Buzzworm could hide there out of the way. I’m running a scan to see if all of the storage space is accounted for. What about you? Any more problems?”

  Med shrugged. “One was enough.”

  Roger glanced down at the computer he had been working on, watching the progress chart of the scan. Med could see he had been using a keyboard that slid out on a tray from the rack mount. He turned back to her. “Jo doesn’t know about your run-in with Buzzworm, does she?”

  Med stared at him, watching the bright points of light streak across the surface of his glasses. “I’d rather deal with that myself. I thought we had an agreement?”

  “Think about it, Med. Maybe Buzzworm isn’t hiding in here.” He waved his hand to take in the server room. “Maybe it’s hunkered down in your top secret system. Wherever that is. And I’m just wasting my time here.”

  “Believe me. I’ve looked. There’s nothing there. The company that built that system for us has looked as well. It’s clean.”

  “But you said that Buzzworm was able to attack you through this GIPETTO program. Doesn’t that worry you?”

  Med shook her head. She clearly didn’t want to discuss the incident. “What I saw wasn’t the virus. It was obviously a stupid trick played by one of the developers on our team to look like the virus. Or a sick joke by someone like Frank Scammel. That would be right up his alley.”

  Roger was back down on his haunches, checking the progress of his search. “So Frank had access to GIPETTO?”

  “He was part of our team.”

  “When was that video sent to you?”

  Med swallowed hard. “Shortly after 1:30 AM.”

  Roger stood up again. “But that was just before he killed himself. Jo said that the time of death was around two. Maybe he was trying to tell you something.”

  Med turned, a look of mild disgust on her face “I’m done for the day, Roger. I’m having dinner with my sister tonight. You have my cell number if you learn anything new.”

  Out in the parking lot Med climbed into her Honda Civic, started the engine and cranked up her dash mounted MP3 player. She was angry. She had visions of her entire team standing around a large flat panel display, mouths open, as they watched the devil character in that awful video carry out his violent and graphic sexual assault on her.

  She cringed as she jammed down on the accelerator pedal and roared out onto the street. It had to be Frank’s doing. She had heard that he was a bit of a sex freak; liked to place the faces of CIA staffers on pictures of naked bodies he found on his perverted web sites and share it with some of the other guys in the lab. She hated men like Frank and the thought of his gory death gave her a slight shiver of satisfaction, which surprised her.

  So if Frank was behind her video, and he w
as dead, why was it still going on? Did he have a partner? And though Frank was good at imagery, there was no way he was smart enough to cause all the other problems the CIA was experiencing. But knowing that GIPETTO was now safe from further intrusion made her relax slightly. She had felt guilty about not taking her issues to Jo, her biggest fear that any focus would bring the horrible video to light.

  Her smart phone beeped at her and she resisted the urge to pick it up while in traffic. She waited for the next light and snatched the device from the cup holder near the shifter. There was a text message from the help desk at Building 213. She frowned as she scrolled down through the text.

  Just off the newswire. Two young children found murdered in their home this afternoon in Washington — a domestic dispute that ended in a double homicide. How horrible! There was a reference to a photo she couldn’t see. Why would someone send this to her? Then she saw the names. Abraham and Chloe. Med felt the car seem to lurch, her balance slipping away from her. Those were the names of Laura’s kids. Her sister’s babies. This was a sick joke or a bizarre coincidence. She continued to read. The news story mentioned Silver Spring. The area her sister lived in. With her annoying husband.

  Med pulled over to the side of the road when she heard the car behind her hit the horn. The light had changed and she hadn’t noticed. She felt like the temperature in the car had dropped twenty degrees.

  She hit the speed dial on her smart phone. She wanted to believe more than anything else that this was just another sick Buzzworm prank. The phone rang twice and then a male voice answered.

  “Officer Lee. Who’s calling, please?” Med froze. She couldn’t believe what she had just heard. A police officer! She hit the cancel button and held the phone in her hand, unable to move, but unable to put the phone down. She stared at the screen, her whole universe now a tiny glowing icon that represented her sister’s speed dial number. Slowly, deliberately, she pressed the button again. Number two. Yes. She was certain she had somehow misdialed before.