by Graham Brown
Danielle was beaming; finally she had something to grasp. “So we just need a little astronomy work to tell us where the sun would settle on that date.”
“I suppose we’ll need it for accuracy,” he said. “But as luck would have it, it’s only January and we’re so close to the Solstice that I can point us in the rough direction.” He extended his arm toward the western horizon, his palm flat and vertical like a blade. The line of sight ran down his arm and over his thumb to indicate the course. “Right about there,” he said. “Just south of where the sun went down.”
As she looked in that direction, Danielle could feel her heart racing. She had to believe they would find what they were looking for there. It made sense in every way. A large population center would be more important than an outlying relic. Items of stature would be brought there, or kept there: gold, silver, jewels and possibly crystals like the ones Blackjack Martin had found. One step closer, she thought. “We leave at first light.”
“We should do some cleanup and weather-proofing here first,” McCarter said. “It’s only right.”
“Twenty-four hours,” she granted. “No more.”
He nodded and she turned to Hawker, who seemed less enthused. In fact, he seemed disappointed. “What’s wrong with you?” she asked. “Aren’t you impressed?”
“Absolutely,” he said. “This is incredible. It’s just … I wanted to hear the rest of the story. What happened to Zipacna? I mean, it couldn’t end like that. Surely someone paid Zipacna back for what he did, right?”
Danielle laughed. “Revenge?”
“Justice,” Hawker said, smiling.
Susan spoke up. “Actually, someone did take care of Zipacna. The same demi-gods who destroyed Seven Macaw.”
“How?” Hawker asked.
This time McCarter replied. “They used a crab to bait him, luring him into a cave. Once he was inside they trapped him underneath it. Sealing him there for all eternity, beneath a mountain of stone.”
CHAPTER 18
WHILE THE REST of the team packed up and readied themselves for the journey across land, Danielle sat on the deck of the Ocana, using the satlink to report their progress.
To her great joy, Gibbs was unavailable and she’d been connected with the only other person cleared for communication with her: Arnold Moore.
She explained their discovery to him and made a request. “I want to send the rest of the team home. I’ll go on with Verhoven’s group, but we need to get the civilians out of here.”
“Professor McCarter and Ms. Briggs?”
“Yes,” she said. “Along with the porters and Devers and Polaski,” she said, reminding him that they were part of Research Division, not Operations, and didn’t really belong out in the field on an operation of this magnitude.
“Why now?” Moore asked. “Has something happened?”
“I don’t think we need them anymore,” she said. “And yes, there was a small incident the other night with a pair of natives,” she said, referring to the incursion that had led Hawker and Verhoven into the pit.
“Anyone hurt?”
“No,” she said. “But I have a bad feeling that it won’t be the last we see of them. Besides, we have our trail now. We can follow it and get assistance remotely if we need it for translation or interpretation.”
“Gibbs will never go for that,” he said, telling her something she already knew. “You can’t imagine the paranoia back here. He wants you to stop reporting completely now. Only verbal communication with him or me from here on out. No record.”
They’d been sending bogus “filler” reports for the past month, but now Gibbs didn’t even want that. He seemed to be coming unglued.
“Why?” she asked.
“He’s become convinced that someone took out Dixon’s team and he’s on a mole hunt to find out how the info got out. He’s worried that any type of disclosure could endanger you.”
“All the more reason to get these people out of here,” she said, exasperated.
Silence followed for a moment.
“You know I agree with you,” Moore said finally. “But it’s not going to happen, so we have to stop talking about it.”
Danielle listened to the meaning behind the words. Even in the somewhat distorted pitch that the satellite and the encryption technology caused, Moore’s point was clear: Worry about what you can control, not what you can’t.
“I know this is difficult,” he added. “But the best thing you can do for them is to keep moving at top speed. The sooner you have a confirmed location, the sooner Gibbs will let you pull them.”
In her heart she knew that. She’d hoped the trail would be enough, but things often worked backward in Gibbs’ mind. The closer they got to success, the more he would push the boundaries, and the more he would risk to close the deal. She would go forward and one of two things would happen. They would find something strong enough to make Gibbs pull the civilians. Or the overdue rains would finally come back to the Amazon and the whole group would have to leave as torrential downpours flooded the forest.
“Fine,” she said. “Then tell him we’re moving. I’ll contact you in twenty-four hours.”
“Affirmed,” he said, then added, “And Danielle, watch your back. And your front and both sides. Gibbs is paranoid, but it doesn’t mean he’s wrong. So be careful. I don’t want you disappearing on me.”
She smiled at his concern, and out of the corner of her eye she saw Hawker approaching. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ll be fine.”
She terminated the link and began to shut down and pack up the system as Hawker walked up.
“Everyone’s ready,” he said.
They’d come to a temporary parting of the ways. Hawker would reboard the Ocana and sail downriver back to Manaus, while the rest of the group moved westward on foot in the direction indicated by the glyphs they’d found. Upon discovering any sign of the expected Mayan outpost, they would contact Hawker and cut a landing zone out of the forest so that he could fly in the heavier equipment and bulk supplies that were too cumbersome to carry.
“Good.”
He studied her. “You seem a little upset. You’re going to miss me, aren’t you?”
She laughed. “That’s debatable,” she said. “But I am worried about being extended this far out. You’re our only link back now. So don’t fall in a hole or anything.”
As he laughed, she broke into a broad grin. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d joked with someone so easily. “I’ll contact you as soon as we’ve found the site. Be ready to bring in the equipment I listed.”
“Your defense system,” he said.
“And the dogs Verhoven wants,” she replied, pulling her pack on.
“Right,” he said. “I’m really looking forward to a helicopter filled with barking mutts.”
Behind them the Ocana’s big diesel rumbled to life. The captain whistled to Hawker, who nodded and then turned back to Danielle. He reached out and straightened her pack, adjusting one of the straps like a parent sending a child off to school. She slapped his hand away and then stepped down the makeshift gangplank to join the rest of the group.
Ten minutes later the Ocana was out of sight and Danielle and her people were moving deeper into the forest. As they left the river behind, any semblance of a fresh breeze vanished and the air took on the feeling of a sauna, stifling and motionless and growing hotter with each passing hour.
The rains had held off so far, with the weather pattern influenced by the forming El Niño. For the most part that had been a blessing, but after two weeks without a hint of shade, a quick, cool shower would have been welcome relief.
Despite the conditions, the group made good time, traveling through the twilight beneath the canopy, surrounded by towering shapes of impossibly large trees. McCarter in particular seemed to have a new spring in his step, and Danielle watched as he pointed out things on the way, particular plants and bright orchids, and trees dying in the twisted embrace of t
he strangler fig.
Danielle tried to ignore him. She was thinking of the bigger picture, prodded on by Moore’s faith in her, the desire to prove herself to Gibbs and her own need to finish what she started. But there was more to it than that. If she was right, they were closing in on the source of the crystals Martin had found years ago, crystals that seemed to be capable of creating energy from cold fusion.
It was bigger than her, she knew that, bigger than them all, but she was the one carrying the knowledge and it left her feeling very alone, isolated, back out on that island that Hawker had so accurately described. And though Hawker was still in the dark, he had a sense of what she was going through and in some way had begun to share that weight. It had given them a bond and she had even begun to trust him.
She hated to admit it but she missed his presence, even his bad jokes. She found herself looking forward to his return, to a degree she would not have expected.
At the moment though, her attention returned to the march and the latest delay in their progress. McCarter had stopped the procession for another Discovery Channel moment, showing the others a huge rubber tree with its smooth, plasterlike wood and a trunk that spread apart like a group of massive vertical blades. A thin black line of ants were crawling along the bark, hundreds of them in single file with little leaves in their mouths.
Ants! He’d stopped the hike to watch some ants!
“Look at them,” he said. “Don’t they remind you of us, carrying their little packs?”
She shook her head. “Not unless you can show me one who keeps stopping the group and holding everyone up.”
His face wrinkled, he’d been as giddy as a schoolboy since the discovery of the Wall, with a demeanor to match. “No,” he said. “But see this little one over here bossing the others around. He reminds me of—”
She gave him the look and he stopped midsentence. With a smile he turned from the ants and reengaged in the trek, launching into a whistling chorus of “High Hopes” as he went. This time she couldn’t help but laugh.
By the fifth day, they came across evidence of a small structure. It wasn’t much more than a loose pile of stone covered with plant growth and moss, but it was enough to tell them they were in the right area. A few hours later they stumbled upon a sight Danielle could not explain, even as she gazed at it in wonder.
She stepped from the shadows of the rainforest into a large, circular clearing populated by nothing more than scrubby weeds and pale, dry grasses. The darkness they’d hiked through for the past five days cowered behind her, while the blinding sunlight poured in unchallenged. Here, the forest surrendered a dominion that held sway for hundreds of miles in every direction. But that was the smaller surprise.
Danielle squinted against the sudden brightness, using a hand to shield her eyes. At the center of the clearing a gray stone pyramid towered above the flat, open ground. Its steep walls were smooth and unmarked on three sides, while a single stairway ran up its face to a small, square roof, fifteen stories above the forest floor.
A structure of unmistakably Mayan design, as perfect as could be—and yet, for reasons Danielle, and later McCarter, found hard to explain, it seemed out of place and foreign. Not only shouldn’t it have been there in the greater sense of all they knew about the Mayan race, but it shouldn’t have appeared as it did. It should have been buried in a tangled web of living trees, vines and soil, just as McCarter had been telling the group since day one. It should have been crumbling under the weight of its own stonework, failing and dilapidated as it drowned in the thickening rainforest and its ever-constricting grip.
But it was none of these things. It stood unencumbered and menacing, defiantly unbowed. It unnerved her in a way she could not explain.
At the mere sight of it, the other members of the team began shouting, whooping and hollering in celebration and congratulating one another. Several of them began running toward the pyramid, racing to the foot of the temple as if the first to touch it would win some unspoken prize.
They sprinted past, pausing briefly to congratulate her, before corralling McCarter and dragging him off with them, victorious.
Danielle let them go, preferring to savor the moment. As she walked farther into the clearing and its blissful daylight, she felt a great sense of accomplishment. At long last, she had something concrete to point to. The temple could not disappear like the other leads had. It could not turn out to be a sham or a hoax or a mistake in translation. It was tangible, concrete and irrefutable. She would find what they were looking for and she would return to Washington a hero.
CHAPTER 19
MATT BLUNDIN SAT IN Stuart Gibbs’ office, aggravated and exhausted at the end of a seventeen-hour day. The director sat across from him, leaning back in his chair, head tilted upward, eyes staring blankly at the ceiling.
At 2:00 A.M. in Washington, Blundin had just finished explaining the nuances of a developing situation: a security breach and data theft that he’d only recently discovered.
Gibbs brought himself forward and exhaled loudly. “What else do you have?”
“That’s it,” Blundin said. “All we know right now is what happened.”
“I don’t give a shit about what happened,” Gibbs cursed. “I want to know how it happened, why it happened and who the fuck made it happen.” With the last phrase, Gibbs threw the report across the desk, where it fanned out and crashed into Blundin’s prominent gut.
Blundin rubbed his neck. He was sweaty and grimy after such a long day and ready to lash out. But that would just make for a longer night. He plucked the report from his lap and placed it back on the desk, out of Gibbs’ reach, then pulled a dented pack of Marlboros from his breast pocket.
He drew one out and stuck it between his lips. Two flicks of the lighter and the tip was glowing red. Only after a long drag on the cigarette did he begin to reply.
“Look,” he said, white smoke billowing from his mouth. “I can tell you how it was probably done. I can even tell you when it was probably done, but that doesn’t help us with the who, because it could have been anybody on the network, either inside this building or out.”
Gibbs leaned back, looking pleased for the first time all night. “Let’s start with how.”
“Fine,” Blundin said. “We can start there, but we’re going to end up right back where we are now.” He exhaled another cloud of carcinogens and reached for an ashtray to lay the cigarette on. “It all starts with the codes. Our system uses a matrix code generated from a set of prime numbers and then exercised through a complex algorithm.”
Gibbs seemed lost already, which came as no surprise to Blundin. Maybe this was why he hadn’t listened in the first place.
Blundin leaned forward, demonstrating with his hands. “Just think of it like a combination lock. If you don’t know the combination you can eventually figure it out by checking every number against every other possible combination of numbers. You know, one, one, one, then one, one, two, then one, one, three—until eventually you get to thirty-six, twenty-six, thirty-six and it finally opens. Only in our case, we’re not talking about forty numbers or whatever you have on one of those locks, we’re talking about a massive set of possibilities.”
“How massive?”
“Try a one with seventeen zeroes after it,” Blundin said. “So many numbers that if you counted a thousand a second it would take you a hundred years just to count that high.”
Blundin eased back in his chair. “And that’s just to count them. To crack the code, each number would have to be checked against every other number, and then tested to see if it worked.”
By the look on his face, Gibbs seemed to understand. “What about the vendor, the manufacturer who sold us this encryption?”
“No,” Blundin said. “The illegal entries were made using an inactive master code reserved by the computer in case the system locks up.”
“What about an ex-employee?” Gibbs asked. “Someone who might know the system, but quit or got fired.�
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“I already checked. No one higher than a receptionist has left Atlantic Safecom since we installed the system.”
“And here?”
“Every time one of our employees leaves, their code and profile are scrubbed from the system—and like I already said, it wasn’t an employee code, it was a master code.”
Gibbs pounded a fist on the desk. “Well, goddamnit, how the hell did they get the master code? That’s what I’m asking you. I mean, they didn’t fucking guess it, did they?”
“Actually,” Blundin said, “in a way, they did.”
Gibbs’ eyes narrowed, which Blundin took as a veiled threat that if he didn’t become more forthright, there would be repercussions.
“They made a lot of guesses,” Blundin said. “Over three hundred and fifty quadrillion.”
Gibbs’ face went blank. “That doesn’t even sound like a real fucking number.”
“It is,” Blundin assured him. “That’s what it takes to crack the code. That’s what I’ve been warning you about for the past year.”
Gibbs was silent, no doubt recalling Blundin’s requests to de-link from Research Division and his claims that the code could be vulnerable to a special type of computer-assisted probing. “The hacker problem,” Gibbs said finally. “Using a supercomputer or something. Is that how this was done?”
Blundin shifted in his chair. “Under normal circumstances, I would say no. Because even a supercomputer basically does things in series, checking one number against another, raising them by a single exponent and running them through a single algorithm. Even at the speed of your average Cray or Big Blue you’re still talking too many numbers and too much time.” Blundin paused and did some calculations in his head. “Might take a year or two of continuous, uninterrupted operation.”