by C. R. Daems
"No, ma'am. Just that I was being assigned to project Owlet, a project that neither Admiral Tilley nor I have ever heard mentioned. I assume they are little owls." He smiled with genuine amusement.
"Yes, small and fragile, which is the reason they need to be very careful if they wish to grow old," I said, and watched his face turn serious. "The people you will be helping me to identify are very dangerous and would kill without a second thought to protect their identity. And they are smart and efficient. They kidnapped me while I was being guarded by three Marines. They didn't kill me, only because the people who paid them wanted me alive."
"You were on the FPU cruiser we captured?" he asked, looking down in thought. "There are a lot of rumors…"
"You will be operating under P1A authority," I said, choosing to ignore his interest in the FPU cruiser. "The only people you can discuss this project with, without going to prison or alerting the killers to your involvement, is Admiral Lulltrel's staff." I waited until he nodded. "I believe there is a criminal organization which has operatives on many of our military cruisers. I believe I can trace six murders directly to them. In addition, they are selling information to foreign criminals who are hijacking UAS Merchants."
"Wow. I don't know what I was expecting but this wasn't it. You need me to do?"
"If I'm right, they are using the Internet to communicate with whoever is their planet-side contact. I understand the system collects and saves some information when a crew member connects to the Internet using the cruiser's system," I said and waited.
"Yes, but it's very limited. The system ID the person is using, which maybe one of the four or five the ship provides or the individual’s private device, and the Internet Protocol, IP address the person accesses. The information is recycled every few days. The default is five days, but the captain can change the default if he wishes."
"The first step will be to determine the sites that the criminals visit. Step two will be to collect the keystrokes to that site. And step three to collect the information the site sends to the Hijackers." When I finished, Odom looked to be deep in concentration. "Oh, how would you like to examine a FPU cruiser's system?"
"Yes, ma'am." His eyes lit with excitement.
* * *
When we exited the shuttle into the Shark's shuttle bay the next day, Dr. Renata was waiting.
"Good morning. Although we believe the Shark has been completely decontaminated and no longer contains any remnants of the Coaca Virus, I have decided to err on the side of caution. Therefore, I have provided encapsulated suits with self-contained breathable apparatus for your protection. Do not take them off until you are ready to leave and they have been decontaminated. Any questions?" Renata said. Looking around, I thought everyone was relieved to be wearing protective suits.
"I loaded a map of the ship on your tablets in case you get lost. Newman, Atkins, and Cooper--I'd like you to search the crew quarters. Record what you find, even if it doesn't seem relevant, since the same object in multiple rooms may be important. If you find anything you want to examine more closely in the office, put it in one of the bags Dr. Renata has provided. It will need to be decontaminated before we leave the ship. Odom, come with me. We'll examine the Bridge and the captain's office," I said, as everyone began putting on their protective gear. When everyone was ready, I led them to the crew's quarters and then left with Odom to the Bridge, with Pannell and four Marines following. I wasn't sure how anyone was going to get to me up here, but I understood Pannell's paranoia. Odom stood looking around the room, mesmerized.
"It's funny, in a way. I work on the software, fix problems, and add new features, but I've never been on the Bridge of a cruiser. We have a mockup of it in our lab, but it isn't the same as the real thing."
"Have fun. I'll be in the captain's office if you need me," I said, pointing out the first door on the left in the corridor—after I had checked the weapons and helm panels to ensure they couldn't be activated.
"What am I looking for?" he asked.
"Locations of the other FPU Cruisers, communications with anyone, information about merchants, contacts… holler if you are in doubt." I entered the captain's office and began going through his desk but didn't find anything of interest. Then I tried his quarters. I found his tablet but it was locked and carried it back to the Bridge.
"Odom, can you break into this tablet?" I asked, holding it out to him. "Find anything interesting?"
"We have programs to find passwords but, depending on the passwords he used, it could take hours or years. Years in his case, since I imagine he used a foreign language word or words." He shrugged. "But I did notice that he tampered with the cruiser's ID. The original appears to have been Shark. But they also used Traveller and Pontus."
* * *
Several hours later, Renata wandered onto the Bridge. "This ship is huge. I've travelled on a cruiser before but was confined to a small area. And I can understand why Sinclair always referred to them as submarines. When people are roaming around you don't notice. But when it's empty the size and the confinement hits you." She nodded to me. "Walk with me, Anna."
I understood it was more than a casual request and nodded, letting her pick our direction.
"How does it feel being back on the Shark?"
"I miss the four horsemen," I quipped. "At the time, I was out of my mind with fever and probably in stage five Coaca. I couldn't recognize one hallway or room from another. Even the killing was without thought." I gave a snort. "I was being pulled toward something and killed everything in the way that might stop or impede me."
"Red?" Renata asked. I stood looking at her for a long time, unconsciously stroking Red.
"This is between you and me." I waited for her to nod. "Red does some strange things, like finding me in the snow. Mother believes Red and I were meant to chase bad guys," I said. Renata said nothing for several minutes, then nodded.
"Red couldn't leave the room and you certainly would have died if you hadn't found him," Renata said while stroking her chin. When I looked, we were in front of the entrance to the cargo hold. "How do you feel?"
"Death doesn't scare me. I'm not in a rush but have long accepted I'm unlikely to live a normal life span. I wouldn't want to repeat the experience on the Shark and expect I'll be sleeping in my mother's bed for a long time, but I'm determined to enjoy each day. I've a job I love, a wonderful mother, and good friends like you." I laughed. "So, let's go visit that container you brought me here to see."
"No, after seeing the bodies stacked in that container, it probably scares me more than it does you." She gave me a tight hug, ignoring Red, and turned me back in the direction we had come. We stayed almost two days.
"Commander Odom found that the cruiser pretended to be the merchant ship Traveller, and the UAS Cruiser Pontus. Your homework for our next staff meeting is to track those identities," I said during the shuttle ride to the planet.
* * *
"I waited until I saw Admiral Lulltrel walking toward the conference room before entering with Commander Odom. Everyone jumped up and headed toward me, but stopped when Commander Spalding called, "Attention."
"At ease," she said as she entered and sat. "Commander Paulus was kidnapped by the people we are seeking under Project Owlet and turned over to the Hijackers. Although I know you are concerned and curious, I'd ask you to refrain from asking her questions. Let her decide what she is comfortable saying in her own time." Lulltrel looked to me and stood as her aide called attention and Admiral Webb entered. I bolted to attention, along with everyone else. Webb walked over to me. "Commander Paulus, you have been awarded the Navy Medal of Honor for your actions on the FPU Cruiser Shark, along with a second silver oak leaf cluster on your Purple Heart ribbon. And a new battle ribbon for action against the Hijackers. Congratulations, Commander Paulus." He held out a hand, which I took. Then he turned to the group. "This presentation is part of the Owlet and Rabbit Projects and therefore classified. We don't want to advertise Commander Paulus'
s part in the loss of their cruiser." After a lot of congratulations, Webb left and Lulltrel sat causing everyone to sit.
"Since you missed my last few staff meetings, perhaps you should start, Paulus," Lulltrel said, suppressing a smile.
"Yes, ma'am. I went to Stone Ring and Westar seeking information concerning the Owlet Project. There I was kidnapped by the very people we are trying to identify. They delivered me to the Hijackers, who are operating with a FPU cruiser, which ties the kidnappers directly to the Rabbit Project. And if you have never been on a FPU cruiser, I wouldn't recommend it. The ride was bumpy, the accommodations poor, the service atrocious, the help rude, and the entertainment boring." I took a drink of coffee. "Before they kidnapped me, I identified several murders that do not appear to be local killings and compared them to dates when UAS cruisers were in port. I found six cruisers which were each in port during at least two of the murders. That might be a coincidence if it involved only one or two cruisers, but not six." I paused for a sip of coffee. "I believe the Owlet group is using the internet to communicate with their contact on each system."
"Why?" Leyva asked, leaning forward.
"Necessity. You arrive in port not sure how much planet-side leave you are going to get or when. So you need to know if they have a job for you and your crew and what it is so you can decide whether you want it and to prepare. Even if they aren't in port long enough to take the assignment, I believe they get paid for reporting the cruiser's planned itinerary. So you can make money without leaving the ship. And besides saving time, the Internet keeps the parties anonymous," I said and Leyva nodded. "Let me introduce Lieutenant Commander Odom. He's a cruiser systems programmer whom I've manage to borrow. I'd like the Owlet Team's help in designing a software patch to the cruisers system that is capable of storing the IPs accessed while the ship is in port and all the keystrokes of each session."
"I know you have P1A authority, but that would be very controversial if it got out," Byrnes said, frowning.
"True. I thought the software patch could assign a random number to each session. Our first task would be to identify the domain name of the site associated with each IP. Since we have six potential cruisers, I believe a pattern will be obvious. Then we can delete all the sessions which don't involve those sites," I said and sat back. As I had hoped, that created a lot of discussions which lasted until the early hours of the morning. When we finished, Odom had a basis for a prototype patch.
The software would capture the IP, assign a unique number, and store all the keystrokes. It would make no attempt to capture the user's name. That made the data collection less invasive. Besides, names would have been difficult to collect since the users could use the cruisers available devices or use another person's tablet. The collected data would be compacted and sent via the WavCom to the station's NIA computer. The information would be encrypted so only the Project Team could view the data.
* * *
"Well, Daughter, how was your day?" Alexa asked as we sat for dinner.
"Complicated, Mother. Webb joined Lulltrel's staff meeting and gave me a bunch of medals for getting kidnapped. I'm surprised they didn't give Red one," I whined.
Alexa laughed, "Probably because he shares your uniform. What kind of medals?"
I pushed the three boxes toward her. She opened each of the three boxes before saying anything. "I understand the Navy Medal of Honor and think you earned it—several times over. Not for being tortured, but for capturing the hijacker's cruiser." She snorted. "The second silver oak leaf cluster I suspect represents Webb and Lulltrel frustration at the number of times you've been attacked and injured, and one for each session in the Regen unit. But what is this ribbon?" She held up the blue ribbon with a white lightning bolt in the center.
"Webb said it was new, a battle ribbon for action against the Hijackers."
"That's interesting. You have an award no one else in the UAS is authorized to wear." She laughed then pulled me to her. "My reward is having my daughter alive and home."
CHAPTER TEN
Searching for Owlets
The next day, Captain Choi contacted me and requested a meeting. He was willing to come to my office but I chose to meet him on the Scylla. When I arrived, a lieutenant commander was waiting to escort me to Choi's office. I entered and saluted.
"Help yourself to something to drink and have a seat," he said, returning my salute. I'm delighted to see you…looking so well after your ordeal. Frankly, we never thought to see you again."
"Captain Choi, I can tell you I much prefer a ride with you than Captain Santo. He was a terrible host," I said, not sure what else to say. The past couldn't be changed and I wasn't looking for sympathy. He roared with laughter before sobering.
"That's good, because I've been informed by Admiral Webb I'm at your disposal."
"I'd like a favor, if you don't mind," I said, knowing this was, and would continue to be, a sensitive topic."
"I suspect you have an unlimited credit account after bringing home the Shark. Nonetheless, I'd be glad to do anything to help you catch those people. And of course, I'm hoping the Scylla will get a chance at a few of those FPU cruisers." He smiled.
"I have a system programmer working on a system patch…" I went on to explain the patch the Owlet Team had outlined. "I'd like to use your ship to test it before we place it on other ships. You are welcome to be involved and to see the results."
"You believe…ship crew kidnapped you." It was more a question than a statement. He looked to Pannell, who had entered with me.
"It was carried out with military precision. I had two Marines in the elevator and two waiting two floors below in the lobby. They got away clean without firing a shot." For a second his face flared in anger.
"How?"
"Gas."
"Yes, it fits everything we know. And it shows they are in league with the Hijackers since they delivered me to them. In addition, I believe they are feeding the Hijackers information about cruiser deployment, which enables the Hijackers to avoid detection." I spent an hour explaining the correlation of the murders and cruisers in port at the time.
"The Scylla is yours to go wherever you want and to test your software…and to destroy the hijackers and their cruisers." Choi laughed and raised his glass to me.
* * *
When I entered my conference room, Stamm called attention and everyone stood and braced to attention.
"At ease," I said walking over to the group which included Odom.
"We were just discussing our inspection of the Shark," Cooper said, eyes bright with excitement. "Ironically, none of us has ever been on a cruiser, except as a passenger. It was amazing."
"If I didn't have Red," I put my hand to my neck to stroke Red and he wrapped around my arm, "I think I would have loved cruiser duty."
"I think you are right for NIA," Atkins said, surprising me. "Those names put us one step closer. The Traveller is the name of an active merchant, but it doesn't appear to ever visit any planets. And the Pontus is the name of a UAS cruiser which was decommissioned ten years ago. That appears to confirm your conjecture that the Hijackers are pretending to be UAS Navy ships conducting routine inspections."
"And using the WavCom to communicate with their contacts," Newman said.
I laughed. "If true, that may mean you may get cruiser time before this project is over.
After the meeting, Odom showed me the status of his software program. I had Stamm visit several websites on Odom's system simulator and then reviewed the results. The IP and all the keystrokes were there.
"Of Course, I still have to write the routine to send it to the WavCom and back to NIA." He smiled. "But I wanted to show you and get your input."
"That is going to be a lot a data," I said, thinking about the number of ships and stops. "Would it be possible to activate and deactivate the program via the WavCom?"
Odom sat thinking for a long time. "Not without the captain or Comm Officer's help."
"Can you se
nd the information in two packages: one with the IP that was accessed and the second package with the keystrokes?"
"Why?"
"First order of business is to determine the website the system contact uses and then to review the key strokes to determine what information is being sent and received. Once we have the website or sites we are looking for, we can delete all the information which isn't linked to those sites. I'd like to keep the IPs until we are sure we have all the relevant sites. We also need a switch to deactivate your software patch after we have what we want. I want to ensure it's clear to any subsequent investigation that we weren't violating anyone's rights without reasonable cause."
* * *
The next two weeks I spent most of my time reviewing the test results with Odom. Hadley designated a bank of storage to collect and store the data. When we thought it ready, I had Lulltrel's staff on the Scylla for the test. Odom activated the system patch, and each of the staff spent an hour visiting websites using either the Scylla's devices or their own tablets. The next day we met in Hadley's work area to review the results. Hadley then had one of her people write a program to delete any data not linked to specific IPs. By the end of the week I thought we were ready, and Admiral Webb gave Admiral Tilley orders to upload Odom's system update on all UAS cruisers. It was listed as a routine update.
"This is exciting," Hadley said, sipping a cup of coffee in my office.
"The hard work is coming," I said. "We'll have to review hundreds of IPs and trace them to a website, then deduce which is being used to make contact, and then determine what information is being sent. And that's only the beginning. We will have to determine who owns or maintains the website and what information they are sending to…the Traveller and figure out how to decode the messages. That could be easy or difficult to decipher depending on how clever they are. And they appear very careful in maintaining their anonymity."
"Details," she said, waving a hand in the air. Suddenly she sobered. "How are you holding up?" she asked, changing topics. "You look much better but…"