Virus

by Bill Buchanan

  “What about Scott?” Craven asked, lowering himself into the seat. “When do you plan to tell them?”

  With a blank stare, Mason gazed through the glass walls of the Crow’s Nest. “Tomorrow, after they get some sleep; but we’re not going anywhere until we’re ready. They won’t get but one chance and to die trying is to fail. Livermore and Yuri’s folks in Kaliningrad are working round the clock. They offer our greatest hope. Freedom's armor must have some Achilles’ heel, some weakness we can exploit. Before we make our next move, Livermore must characterize this virus, no matter what it takes. We’ve got to have a plan for boarding Freedom that will work; we’ve got to find some weakness.”

  “Hope's the perfect place to train for an assault on Freedom," Craven said with a sense of purpose. “Scott and her crew can train by attacking Hope. We’ll work out the bugs, refine it until we get it right.”

  Placing his head in his hands, Mason wearily nodded agreement. “But we’ve such a long way to go.” Mason seemed almost asleep. Craven realized Mason had developed a capacity to live with crisis by taking short naps, much in the same way Winston Churchill did during World War II. If he allowed each crisis to take its toll, he would have died long ago of anxiety. Now, his eyes half closed, his face relaxed, Mason looked closer to his real age. No one ever makes the complete adjustment to constant tension. Responsibility had laid circles under Mason’s eyes, etched lines around his mouth, given his powerful, elegant hands the slightest tremor.

  “Do what you can, Slim, then don't worry about it. Wor-rying’ll kill you. Believe in yourself and trust in your staff. They’re good people, they’re behind you, and they’ll pull through. After a little rest, you’ll see things more clearly. This problem is man-made, it can be solved, and your team can do it.” Craven paused a moment, and shifted the subject to a smaller, more immediate problem. “You thought about Hinson?”

  Mason felt like unloading on Hinson, but he knew this wasn’t the time. He would sleep on his decision and wait until tomorrow, when his head was clear. “Hinson has no place in his heart for anyone but Hinson,” Mason replied with a matter-of-fact tone of voice. “I want him out of the service. Yuri suggested an officer exchange program assignment counting penguins on the tundra of the New Siberian Islands. His idea has merit, but I plan to give Hinson a choice. Either join the civilian community or count penguins.”

  “It’s your operation,” Craven said, never second-guessing Mason’s judgment. Craven was silent for a few moments as he studied Mason’s face. Mason’s temples were raw, and the circles under his eyes had darkened. “You look like death warmed over, Slim. How about some sack time?”

  Mason eyed the empty cots in the corner of the conference room then checked his watch. General Krol or Colonel Napper could run the store while Mason slept, but they were both out like a light. “Krol and Napper are asleep,” Mason lamented quietly.

  Craven smiled. “I’ll wake you if anything hot comes down.” His voice conveyed concern.

  Mason didn’t need to hear it twice.

  PART

  6

  THE DAY

  OF RECKONING

  DAY 5-

  DECEMBER 11, 2014

  20

  The Black Hole, 12/1112014, 0525 Zulu, 12:25 A.M. Local

  Inside Air Force Prototype Hangar Designated Big

  Blue,

  Hanscom Field,

  Bedford, Massachusetts

  Intensely bright white flashes from an arc welder illuminated the hangar’s interior like an enormous strobe light. Thomas Jackson, the radar expert from MIT Lincoln Lab, watched from a safe distance as the welder guided his torch down the tapered, pyramid-shaped wall of the anechoic test chamber, generating a spectacular fireworks display of sparks along the way. Dangling perilously from a cable, suspended eighty feet above the concrete hangar floor, the welder was nervous about laying his final bead. Jackson, speaking from the safety of the catwalk overhead, reminded him they were six months behind schedule and insisted he cut out the bellyaching and get the job done. Angry, but unconvinced, the technician attacked the final seam with a vengeance.

  When the electric torch went out, Jackson breathed a sigh of relief as the two men pulled off their goggles. This latest modification to the test chamber had increased its diameter to eighty feet, allowing it to encase a full-size aircraft. Working with a ball-peen hammer, the welder cleaned away the crusty debris from his final bead while Jackson climbed down from the catwalk. Scaffolding fas-

  tened to the catwalk extended floor to ceiling and surrounded the colossal test chamber. After slowly lowering his overweight carcass onto the scaffolding, Jackson carefully inspected the welds framing the chamber walls. A pompous man with long oily hair, scraggly red beard, and puffy bags under his eyes, Jackson’s abrasive personality failed to inspire confidence, but those who knew him freely admitted—the guy was smart. Satisfied with the welds, Jackson cautiously maneuvered into the walled security of the penthouse. Perched on top of the test chamber one hundred feet above the hangar floor, the one-room penthouse was filled with radar test equipment, arranged about a large viewing porthole in the center of the floor. The penthouse office would be called a laboratory by anyone who did not regularly work in one. To Jackson it seemed more a cluttered test bed, a place to verify his theories, an assessment that was wholly accurate. The room was perhaps five hundred square feet total, and Jackson felt cramped as he worked his way toward the center of the room, squeezing between countless metal racks, each stacked high with test equipment.

  Jackson eventually worked his way through the equipment maze to the aircraft position control panel located by the porthole. Looking down through the porthole into the test chamber, Jackson saw only pitch-black at first. He threw a power switch and floodlights illuminated a large black form, seventy feet across, shaped like the Dorito flying wing. Initially, the aircraft was positioned in a straight and level attitude, but using a combination of valves on the control panel, Jackson could rotate the aircraft into any position he required. He opened a hydraulic valve, then watched the aircraft below slowly rotate skyward. Gradually, his aspect angle began to change as the aircraft pivoted into a near vertical climb. Eventually, when Jackson viewed the flying wing head-on, the wedge shape changed into that of the edge of a Frisbee. Satisfied with the positioning arm’s performance, he believed the aircraft prototype and chamber were ready at last. Getting the positioning arm fitted to the aircraft had taken more time than he’d expected. Too late, Jackson discovered that the positioning arm had to be custom machined and that took time. But now it was ready and he felt relieved.

  To the naked eye, the aircraft inside the test chamber looked like Cowboy’s Dorito down to its air inlets and jet exhaust. Designated the Black Hole prototype, its exterior looked like a McDonnell Douglas EF-12 flying wing in every respect—but it wasn’t.

  21

  Gum, 12/11/2014, 0733 Zulu, 12:33 A.M. Local

  Shripod Addams’ Apartment,

  Colorado Springs, Colorado

  After sifting through the contents of every trash can and cabinet inside Shripod Addams’ apartment, FBI special agent Clint Bridges was frustrated. The sleeves of his white shirt were filthy, there was stubble on his chin, and his neatly cropped snow-white hair was plastered down with sweat and lint picked up from behind the clothes dryer. After thirty years with the bureau, most of it in white-collar computer crime and counterespionage, the G-man knew where to look when it came to searching for physical evidence. After a tedious examination of Shripod’s apartment, the G-man, local police, and captain of security from Cheyenne Mountain determined that Shripod Addams had been interested in computers, maintained a magnificent saltwater aquarium, paid his bills on time, and chewed Juicy Fruit gum. Not much to show for a long night’s work, but they felt the gum could be significant.

  To Clint Bridges’ dismay, it looked as if Shripod Addams had been a fastidious housekeeper; everything was in its place. The inside of the apartment str
uck him as picture-perfect, unlike any bachelor’s home he’d ever seen. The interior looked almost as if it’d never been lived in, like a photo from a House and Garden magazine article, too neat to be true. Shripod’s clothes were cleaned and pressed, bed neatly made with the blanket comers tightly tucked, lunch dishes put away, and his computer desk had been meticulously organized, as if he’d been expecting company. The only signs of life in the apartment were swimming inside Shripod’s aquarium, a large saltwater tank filled with a splendid variety of brightly colored fish. Although everything seemed in order, Bridges was troubled because nothing was ever this neat in real life unless it was staged.

  Rivulets of sweat beaded across Clint’s forehead as he and the lanky Air Force captain of security carefully pried the cover off Shripod’s home computer. After checking the computer for self-destruct explosives and auto-erase hardware, Clint decided it was safe to power Shripod's PC on. “I’m afraid someone got here before we did,” Clint observed quietly as the computer screen flashed to life.

  “Whataya mean?” Scratching the stubble on his angular chin, the gaunt-faced captain looked puzzled. They’d found no evidence of unlawful entry. Nothing damaged, no unusual fingerprints, nothing that would indicate any unauthorized search.

  “This place, it’s all too ... tidy. An airtight package with no loose ends.” Clint opened a desk drawer, pulled out a case containing 3.5-inch floppy disks, then handed it to the captain.

  Casually, the captain opened the case, thumbed through the disks, then remarked, “Yeah, so? Blank disks, what of it?”

  “That’s just it,” quipped Clint. “They’re all blank. No backups, no extra copies, nothing.”

  As the realization of the G-man’s observations sank in, the captain’s expression turned hard. “So either Shripod never used his computer or we’re onto something.”

  Clint nodded. “Check the door locks and windows again. See if one of ’em hasn’t been jimmied.”

  The tall lanky captain stood, walked out of the computer room, then spoke quietly to the local police sergeant in charge of the accident investigation. After a few moments, the sergeant acknowledged agreement, walked outside to his cruiser, and brought back a portable light and a bag of tools. The sergeant and a colleague roped off a clear area around the front doorjamb, set up their high intensity light shining on the door latch plate, then carefully began looking for any evidence that the door might have been forced open—fresh scratches on the metal plate or traces of plastic from a credit card.

  Finally, the lanky captain returned to the computer room only to Find Clint Bridges shaking his head in disbelief.

  “This is incredible,” Clint said after reading over the computer screen. The screen displayed Shripod’s command history file—a terse, summarized record of every computer command Shripod had entered over the last month. “Absolutely incredible!” Clint scrolled through a few more pages, then continued. “I’ll tell you one thing. Shripod Ad-dams was no computer hacker. This guy was a real pro, a guru. He used every trick in the book. Take a look at this.” Clint pointed to a line on the computer screen which read:

  12/09/2014, 12:29 p.m.

  rm -rf /usr/myfiles

  “Don’t follow you, Clint. I’m not into computers. What does it all mean?”

  “Simply this,” the G-man responded as he continued looking through page after page of the command history file. “The day before Shripod Addams was killed, or murdered, he removed all the programs from his hard disk. During his lunch break, he cleaned up his disk and didn’t leave a trace.”

  “Could be coincidence,” the captain remarked, obviously unconvinced.

  “Take another look here,” muttered the G-man with a confident smile. He pointed again to the computer screen. Searching through the history file on Shripod’s computer, the G-man had found what he’d been looking for—proof of unlawful entry. “No doubt about it, our man was murdered. Check the time these commands were entered.”

  The screen read:

  12/10/2014, 1:10 p.m.

  cd /usr

  The lanky captain gulped, murmuring, “You’re right, Clint. Shripod died before one o’clock. Someone used this computer immediately after his death.”

  “That’s the way I see it. Someone was looking for something on Shripod’s hard disk, but my guess is they didn’t find it. Shripod had covered his tracks before they got here.”

  Mulling over his options, the captain’s chest heaved with a sigh of relief. “This is not the answer, but it’s a step in the right direction. Whataya suggest we do from your end, Clint?”

  “Fed-ex the disk to CIA headquarters at Langley. With a little luck, they may be able to reconstruct the contents of the disk.”

  “Good,” said the security captain. “You take care of the disk and I’ll cover Shripod’s car. We’ll go over his Honda with a fine-toothed comb. We know it was murder. We’ll find out how.”

  Finishing up, the G-man said, “Let’s head back to the mountain and pull his records. Interview his friends, pick up a few leads on his family.”

  Checking his watch, the captain quipped, “Yeah, right Clint.” For the first time since their troubles began on Sunday, Cheyenne Mountain was running on a skeleton crew. The first shift regulars were at home asleep. After a moment’s thought, a glimmer shone in the captain’s eye. “Computers have gotten us this far. Let’s round up the Computer Center director and his networking guru. If Shripod’s sent any electronic mail outside the country or to Livermore, maybe he left a trail.”

  “Do it,” remarked the G-man with a wink. “We may be onto something big here. Where it’ll lead, I can’t say, but it feels right!”

  Electronic Trail, 12/11/2014, 0905 Zulu, 2:05 A.M. Local

  Computer Center,

  Basement Floor Of Headquarters Building,

  Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado

  G-man Clint Bridges, a lifelong computer buff, stood on the raised floor inside the Cheyenne Mountain Computer Center staring at the arrays of optical computers and disk storage adorning the floor space from wall to wall. Fascinated, he watched in silent disbelief as the computers collected, stored, and displayed information from all parts of the world. There was more computing power per square foot in the basement of Cheyenne Mountain than in any other single place on earth, and the eerie thing was, the place looked deserted—wall-to-wall computers with no people. All this computing power required almost no local support staff. Most of the computer programming was done at Livermore.

  Divided into four separate areas, the basement served as Cheyenne Mountain’s central brain and nerve center. In the center of the room, orchestrating it all, stood Centurion’s Twin. Identical to Centurion in every respect, Centurion’s Twin coordinated all computer system activity inside Cheyenne Mountain. Operating around the clock, equipment on the south wall connected Cheyenne Mountain computers to thousands of fiber-optic cables feeding sensor data input from all over the world. The north wall provided Cheyenne Mountain’s computer networking gateway to the outside world. Computer networking equipment lining the north wall allowed Cheyenne Mountain computers to talk to each other as well as thousands of other Department of Defense computers scattered across the world. The west wall was lined with backup power supplies that switched on in case of emergency, and finally, the east wall was covered floor to ceiling with projected displays showing global situation information, computer networking traffic, and equipment maintenance information.

  The nerve center was attached to the outside world through pulses of different colored light transmitted inside thousands of fiber-optic cables. The south wall of the basement provided Cheyenne Mountain’s sensor links to the outside world and looked much like the inside of a telephone central office—row after row of eleven-foot-tall metal frames stacked floor to ceiling with rack-mounted optical communication equipment. The equipment against the north wall looked like the world’s largest doughnut and provided Cheyenne Mountain a computer networking hub and gateway to the o
utside world.

  Clint Bridges had never seen such computing power as was in the basement of Cheyenne Mountain. He found the spectacle awe inspiring.

  Clint heard the revolving door turn and saw the Computer Center director lumbering into the room, followed by the lanky captain of security. Middle-aged, flabby skin underneath his chin, with ample girth about the middle, the Comp Center director didn’t look like a happy man.

  Not one for small talk, Clint Bridges got directly to the point, once their introductions were exchanged.

  “Where’s your guru?”

  As Clint asked the question, the revolving door slowly turned again and a tall, thin, thirty-plus fellow with a scrag-gly brown beard walked through carrying a large thirty-two-ounce cup of caffeine-enriched Coke. Clint smiled, thinking, Now there’s a fella ready to work.

  The Computer Center director introduced Craig Strauss to Clint Bridges and the captain, then they got down to the business at hand.