Digital Fortress

by Dan Brown

  happened. Strathmore had thrown the switch and killed all power.

  The silence that engulfed Crypto was instantaneous. The horns choked off mid blare, and the Node 3 monitors flickered to black. Greg Hale's corpse disappeared into the darkness, and Susan instinctively yanked her legs up onto the couch. She wrapped Strathmore's suit coat around her.

  Darkness.

  Silence.

  She had never heard such quiet in Crypto. There'd always been the low hum of the generators. But now there was nothing, only the great beast heaving and sighing in relief. Crackling, hissing, slowly cooling down.

  Susan closed her eyes and prayed for David. Her prayer was a simple one-that God protect the man she loved.

  Not being a religious woman, Susan had never expected to hear a response to her prayer. But when there was a sudden shuddering against her chest, she jolted upright. She clutched her chest. A moment later she understood. The vibrations she felt were not the hand of God at all-they were coming from the commander's jacket pocket. He had set the vibrating silent-ring feature on his SkyPager. Someone was sending Commander Strathmore a message.

  * * *

  Six stories below, Strathmore stood at the circuit breaker. The sublevels of Crypto were now as dark as the deepest night. He stood a moment enjoying the blackness. The water poured down from above. It was a midnight storm. Strathmore tilted his head back and let the warm droplets wash away his guilt. I'm a survivor. He knelt and washed the last of Chartrukian's flesh from his hands.

  His dreams for Digital Fortress had failed. He could accept that. Susan was all that mattered now. For the first time in decades, he truly understood that there was more to life than country and honor. I sacrificed the best years of my life for country and honor. But what about love? He had deprived himself for far too long. And for what? To watch some young professor steal away his dreams? Strathmore had nurtured Susan. He had protected her. He had earned her. And now, at last, he would have her. Susan would seek shelter in his arms when there was nowhere else to turn. She would come to him helpless, wounded by loss, and in time, he would show her that love heals all.

  Honor. Country. Love. David Becker was about to die for all three.

  Chapter 103

  The Commander rose through the trapdoor like Lazarus back from the dead. Despite his soggy clothes, his step was light. He strode toward Node 3-toward Susan. Toward his future.

  The Crypto floor was again bathed in light. Freon was flowing downward through the smoldering TRANSLTR like oxygenated blood. Strathmore knew it would take a few minutes for the coolant to reach the bottom of the hull and prevent the lowest processors from igniting, but he was certain he'd acted in time. He exhaled in victory, never suspecting the truth-that it was already too late.

  I'm a survivor, he thought. Ignoring the gaping hole in the Node 3 wall, he strode to the electronic doors. They hissed open. He stepped inside.

  Susan was standing before him, damp and tousled in his blazer. She looked like a freshman coed who'd been caught in the rain. He felt like the senior who'd lent her his varsity sweater. For the first time in years, he felt young. His dream was coming true.

  But as Strathmore moved closer, he felt he was staring into the eyes of a woman he did not recognize. Her gaze was like ice. The softness was gone. Susan Fletcher stood rigid, like an immovable statue. The only perceptible motion were the tears welling in her eyes.

  "Susan?"

  A single tear rolled down her quivering cheek.

  "What is it?" the commander pleaded.

  The puddle of blood beneath Hale's body had spread across the carpet like an oil spill. Strathmore glanced uneasily at the corpse, then back at Susan. Could she possibly know? There was no way. Strathmore knew he had covered every base.

  "Susan?" he said, stepping closer. "What is it?"

  Susan did not move.

  "Are you worried about David?"

  There was a slight quiver in her upper lip.

  Strathmore stepped closer. He was going to reach for her, but he hesitated. The sound of David's name had apparently cracked the dam of grief. Slowly at first-a quiver, a tremble. And then a thundering wave of misery seemed to course through her veins. Barely able to control her shuddering lips, Susan opened her mouth to speak. Nothing came.

  Without ever breaking the icy gaze she'd locked on Strathmore, she took her hand from the pocket of his blazer. In her hand was an object. She held it out, shaking.

  Strathmore half expected to look down and see the Beretta leveled at his gut. But the gun was still on the floor, propped safely in Hale's hand. The object Susan was holding was smaller. Strathmore stared down at it, and an instant later, he understood.

  As Strathmore stared, reality warped, and time slowed to a crawl. He could hear the sound of his own heart. The man who had triumphed over giants for so many years had been outdone in an instant. Slain by love-by his own foolishness. In a simple act of chivalry, he had given Susan his jacket. And with it, his SkyPager.

  Now it was Strathmore who went rigid. Susan's hand was shaking. The pager fell at Hale's feet. With a look of astonishment and betrayal that Strathmore would never forget, Susan Fletcher raced past him out of Node 3.

  The commander let her go. In slow motion, he bent and retrieved the pager. There were no new messages-Susan had read them all. Strathmore scrolled desperately through the list.

  SUBJECT: ENSEI TANKADO-TERMINATED

  SUBJECT: PIERRE CLOUCHARDE-TERMINATED

  SUBJECT: HANS HUBER-TERMINATED

  SUBJECT: ROCIO EVA GRANADA-TERMINATED…

  The list went on. Strathmore felt a wave of horror. I can explain! She will understand! Honor! Country! But there was one message he had not yet seen-one message he could never explain. Trembling, he scrolled to the final transmission.

  SUBJECT: DAVID BECKER-TERMINATED

  Strathmore hung his head. His dream was over.

  Chapter 104

  Susan staggered out of Node 3.

  SUBJECT: DAVID BECKER-TERMINATED

  As if in a dream, she moved toward Crypto's main exit. Greg Hale's voice echoed in her mind: Susan, Strathmore's going to kill me! Susan, the commander's in love with you!

  Susan reached the enormous circular portal and began stabbing desperately at the keypad. The door did not move. She tried again, but the enormous slab refused to rotate. Susan let out a muted scream-apparently the power outage had deleted the exit codes. She was still trapped.

  Without warning, two arms closed around her from behind, grasping her half-numb body. The touch was familiar yet repulsive. It lacked the brute strength of Greg Hale, but there was a desperate roughness to it, an inner determination like steel.

  Susan turned. The man restraining her was desolate, frightened. It was a face she had never seen.

  "Susan," Strathmore begged, holding her. "I can explain."

  She tried to pull away.

  The commander held fast.

  Susan tried to scream, but she had no voice. She tried to run, but strong hands restrained her, pulling her backward.

  "I love you," the voice was whispering. "I've loved you forever."

  Susan's stomach turned over and over.

  "Stay with me."

  Susan's mind whirled with grisly images-David's bright-green eyes, slowly closing for the last time; Greg Hale's corpse seeping blood onto the carpet; Phil Chartrukian's burned and broken on the generators.

  "The pain will pass," the voice said. "You'll love again."

  Susan heard nothing.

  "Stay with me," the voice pleaded. "I'll heal your wounds."

  She struggled, helpless.

  "I did it for us. We're made for each other. Susan, I love you." The words flowed as if he had waited a decade to speak them. "I love you! I love you!"

  In that instant, thirty yards away, as if rebutting Strathmore's vile confession, TRANSLTR let out a savage, pitiless hiss. The sound was an entirely new one-a distant, ominous sizzling that seemed to grow like a se
rpent in the depths of the silo. The freon, it appeared, had not reached its mark in time.

  The commander let go of Susan and turned toward the $2 billion computer. His eyes went wide with dread. "No!" He grabbed his head. "No!"

  The six-story rocket began to tremble. Strathmore staggered a faltering step toward the thundering hull. Then he fell to his knees, a sinner before an angry god. It was no use. At the base of the silo, TRANSLTR's titanium-strontium processors had just ignited.

  Chapter 105

  A fireball racing upward through three million silicon chips makes a unique sound. The crackling of a forest fire, the howling of a tornado, the steaming gush of a geyser… all trapped within a reverberant hull. It was the devil's breath, pouring through a sealed cavern, looking for escape. Strathmore knelt transfixed by the horrific noise rising toward them. The world's most expensive computer was about to become an eight-story inferno.

  * * *

  In slow motion, Strathmore turned back toward Susan. She stood paralyzed beside the Crypto door. Strathmore stared at her tear-streaked face. She seemed to shimmer in the fluorescent light. She's an angel, he thought. He searched her eyes for heaven, but all he could see was death. It was the death of trust. Love and honor were gone. The fantasy that had kept him going all these years was dead. He would never have Susan Fletcher. Never. The sudden emptiness that gripped him was overwhelming.

  Susan gazed vaguely toward TRANSLTR. She knew that trapped within the ceramic shell, a fireball was racing toward them. She sensed it rising faster and faster, feeding on the oxygen released by the burning chips. In moments the Crypto dome would be a blazing inferno.

  Susan's mind told her to run, but David's dead weight pressed down all around her. She thought she heard his voice calling to her, telling her to escape, but there was nowhere to go. Crypto was a sealed tomb. It didn't matter; the thought of death did not frighten her. Death would stop the pain. She would be with David.

  The Crypto floor began to tremble, as if below it an angry sea monster were rising out of the depths. David's voice seemed to be calling. Run, Susan! Run!

  Strathmore was moving toward her now, his face a distant memory. His cool gray eyes were lifeless. The patriot who had lived in her mind a hero had died-a murderer. His arms were suddenly around her again, clutching desperately. He kissed her cheeks. "Forgive me," he begged. Susan tried to pull away, but Strathmore held on.

  TRANSLTR began vibrating like a missile preparing to launch. The Crypto floor began to shake. Strathmore held tighter. "Hold me, Susan. I need you."

  A violent surge of fury filled Susan's limbs. David's voice called out again. I love you! Escape! In a sudden burst of energy, Susan tore free. The roar from TRANSLTR became deafening. The fire was at the silo's peak. TRANSLTR groaned, straining at its seams.

  David's voice seemed to lift Susan, guide her. She dashed across the Crypto floor and started up Strathmore's catwalk stairs. Behind her, TRANSLTR let out a deafening roar.

  As the last of the silicon chips disintegrated, a tremendous updraft of heat tore through the upper casing of the silo and sent shards of ceramic thirty feet into the air. Instantly the oxygen-rich air of Crypto rushed in to fill the enormous vacuum.

  Susan reached the upper landing and grabbed the banister when the tremendous rush of wind ripped at her body. It spun her around in time to see the deputy director of operations, far below, staring up at her from beside TRANSLTR. There was a storm raging all around him, and yet there was peace in his eyes. His lips parted, and he mouthed his final word. "Susan."

  The air rushing into TRANSLTR ignited on contact. In a brilliant flash of light, Commander Trevor Strathmore passed from man, to silhouette, to legend.

  When the blast hit Susan, it blew her back fifteen feet into Strathmore's office. All she remembered was a searing heat.

  Chapter 106

  In the window of the Director's conference room, high above the Crypto dome, three faces appeared, breathless. The explosion had shaken the entire NSA complex. Leland Fontaine, Chad Brinkerhoff, and Midge Milken all stared out in silent horror.

  Seventy feet below, the Crypto dome was blazing. The polycarbonate roof was still intact, but beneath the transparent shell, a fire raged. Black smoke swirled like fog inside the dome.

  The three stared down without a word. The spectacle had an eerie grandeur to it.

  Fontaine stood a long moment. He finally spoke, his voice faint but unwavering. "Midge, get a crew down there… now."

  Across the suite, Fontaine's phone began to ring.

  It was Jabba.

  Chapter 107

  Susan had no idea how much time had passed. A burning in her throat pulled her to her senses. Disoriented, she studied her surroundings. She was on a carpet behind a desk. The only light in the room was a strange orange flickering. The air smelled of burning plastic. The room she was standing in was not really a room at all; it was a devastated shell. The curtains were on fire, and the Plexiglas walls were smoldering.

  Then she remembered it all.

  David.

  In a rising panic, she pulled herself to her feet. The air felt caustic in her windpipe. She stumbled to the doorway looking for away out. As she crossed the threshold, her leg swung out over an abyss; she grabbed the door frame just in time. The catwalk had disappeared. Fifty feet below was a twisted collapse of steaming metal. Susan scanned the Crypto floor in horror. It was a sea of fire. The melted remains of three million silicon chips had erupted from TRANSLTR like lava. Thick, acrid smoke billowed upward. Susan knew the smell. Silicon smoke. Deadly poison.

  Retreating into the remains of Strathmore's office, she began to feel faint. Her throat burned. The entire place was filled with a fiery light. Crypto was dying. So will I, she thought.

  For a moment, she considered the only possible exit-Strathmore's elevator. But she knew it was useless; the electronics never would have survived the blast.

  But as Susan made her way through the thickening smoke, she recalled Hale's words. The elevator runs on power from the main building! I've seen the schematics! Susan knew that was true. She also knew the entire shaft was encased in reinforced concrete.

  The fumes swirled all around her. She stumbled through the smoke toward the elevator door. But when she got there, she saw that the elevator's call button was dark. Susan jabbed fruitlessly at the darkened panel, then she fell to her knees and pounded on the door.

  She stopped almost instantly. Something was whirring behind the doors. Startled, she looked up. It sounded like the carriage was right there! Susan stabbed at the button again. Again, a whirring behind the doors.

  Suddenly she saw it.

  The call button was not dead-it had just been covered with black soot. It now glowed faintly beneath her smudged fingerprints.

  There's power!

  With a surge of hope, she punched at the button. Over and over, something behind the doors engaged. She could hear the ventilation fan in the elevator car. The carriage is here! Why won't the damn doors open?

  Through the smoke she spied the tiny secondary keypad-lettered buttons, A through Z. In a wave of despair, Susan remembered. The password.

  The smoke was starting to curl in through the melted window frames. Again she banged on the elevator doors. They refused to open. The password! she thought. Strathmore never told me the password! Silicon smoke was now filling the office. Choking, Susan fell against the elevator in defeat. The ventilation fan was running just a few feet away. She lay there, dazed, gulping for air.

  She closed her eyes, but again David's voice woke her. Escape, Susan! Open the door! Escape! She opened her eyes expecting to see his face, those wild green eyes, that playful smile. But the letters A-Z came into focus. The password… Susan stared at the letters on the keypad. She could barely keep them in focus. On the LED below the keypad, five empty spots awaited entry. A five-character password, she thought. She instantly knew the odds: twenty-six to the fifth power; 11,881,376 possible choices. At one guess
every second, it would take nineteen weeks…

  As Susan Fletcher lay choking on the floor beneath the keypad, the commander's pathetic voice came to her. He was calling to her again. I love you Susan! I've always loved you! Susan! Susan! Susan…

  She knew he was dead, and yet his voice was relentless. She heard her name over and over.

  Susan… Susan…

  Then, in a moment of chilling clarity, she knew.

  Trembling weakly, she reached up to the keypad and typed the password.

  S… U… S… A… N

  An instant later, the doors slid open.

  Chapter 108