Encrypted: An Action-Packed Techno-Thriller

by Carolyn McCray

  He put his hands up in mock defeat. “I got it.”

  Quirk returned to finding YouTube footage of local shark attacks as Zach nodded toward the distant speck on the cliff. The castle. Although, with the weather and distance, the structure looked more like a Hobbit house.

  “Are you worried?” Zach asked her.

  “That they haven’t thrown anything at us, despite the fact that we’ve been in range for two minutes?” Ronnie said with a sigh. “Yes, but this could be an instance of ‘they know that we know that they know’ kind of thing.”

  Zach didn’t seem entirely satisfied by that answer, but let it go as the helicopter swooped left—taking them overland. This close to the castle, the Hidden Hand’s underwater defenses were nearly as good as its ground defenses. Ronnie checked the screen monitoring the various mines and water-to-air missiles. All were quiet.

  This assault was like a hack—only they weren’t dealing with code, but with actual lives. And like a hack, this attack was as much a mind game as anything. The targets knew that they were vulnerable to attack. They planned for it. The hackers knew that the targets planned for the attack, so they always had to find chinks in their cyber armor. Back doors. Side entrances. Weak firewalls.

  It basically came down to who knew what in which order, and whether they had time to adapt. Lino must have known what went down in Mexico. He also knew that he had been outflanked at the Met. Ronnie had a pretty deep bag of tricks, but even she was running out of them. What if she’d shown Lino enough to anticipate her next move?

  While the Hidden Hand was filled with soulless bastards, it did not make them stupid. If anything, it made them all the more dangerous. Lines that Ronnie would not cross, the Hidden Hand would leap over with joy.

  And clearly Lino was holding back, waiting until he saw the whites of their proverbial eyes. But waiting for what?

  “Did you know that shark attacks rise steeply during a storm? The agitation of the water—”

  “Quirk.” She waited until he looked up at her. “Did you get my laptop in the box?”

  He rolled his eyes and went back to his shark research. Yes, Quirk’s quirks even got on her nerves at times. But Ronnie knew that when her assistant was on a roll, she couldn’t stop him. Or at least not without wild horses. Instead, she simply double-checked herself as they sped over the thick forest surrounding the castle.

  The clear box seemed so benign. Yet in the end, it could save all their lives.

  “I take it that isn’t just plastic,” Zach said, leaning over to study the construction of the clear box.

  “Not exactly. It is lead-impregnated, airtight, watertight, and maximum EM-shielded.”

  Zach’s eyebrow lifted. “That’s been field-tested?”

  Ronnie felt her cheeks flush. “Okay, so maybe I should have said, ‘in theory’ to start off with.”

  “Okay, but if your computer is in that impenetrable box, then…”

  She pulled out an older version of the keyless-keyboard gloves. These ceramic tiles on her fingertips were much larger, heavier, and quite frankly, a fashion eyesore. But at least they had all their keys.

  “These are—”

  “KeKe-G’s,” Quirk interrupted.

  Okay. That was a cooler name. Ronnie went to explain to Zach what her assistant was talking about when alarms blared.

  Guess it was time to find out who was faster on the draw.

  * * *

  Zach steadied the launcher against the floor of the helicopter, which was easier said than done. Between the bucking winds and the pilot’s maneuvers to evade the six missiles flying toward them the best Zach could do was not fall out the open door.

  “Fire!” Ronnie yelled from the other side of the chopper, where she manned her own launcher.

  He hit the lever, and three countermeasures flew out from the launcher, spraying out in a fan pattern. The missiles took the bait, sharply banking to hone in on the new heat signature. Explosions rang out as the missiles detonated far away from them.

  Pretty slick.

  “Oh, crap!” Ronnie blurted out. She turned to see that one of her missiles not only did not detonate, but also had banked around, heading straight for them. “It must be backtracking the countermeasure’s path.”

  That smart missile was hauling ass in their direction.

  “Zach, fire another countermeasure!”

  He wanted to argue that he was on the other side of the helicopter from the missile, but why bother? Ronnie was giving the orders. He hit the lever, and the countermeasure shot out of the launcher.

  “Keep us parallel!” Ronnie shouted to the pilot.

  The missile came straight for them through the downpour. It felt impossibly wrong that the helicopter stopped its forward momentum and hovered in the battering winds, awaiting its doom.

  “Get down!”

  Zach threw himself to the floor as the missile flew in Ronnie’s door. It scorched them as it exited his door, streaking after the countermeasure. It exploded just above the forest, setting treetops ablaze despite the soaking rain.

  Ronnie had one of those smiles people get when they know that they just cheated death. He rose to join her when Francois exclaimed, “Dear God!”

  If something caused Francois to take the Lord’s name in vain…

  The sight through the chopper’s window should have been something out of the Dark Ages. The castle before them loomed on the horizon, every bit the symbol of power and domination that the builders had intended. The 3-D holographic image did not do the enormous structure justice.

  Red flags emblazed with gilded angelic script whipped in the fierce wind atop stone turrets. Dotted all along the towers were narrow archers’ windows—the ancient equivalent for modern-day snipers. And the Hidden Hand had shown itself more than willing to adopt technology. How many gunmen were hidden in the shadow of the stone?

  Long, wide ramparts, equally well guarded, connected each tower.

  Talk about a tough, protective outer shell.

  A huge, elaborately carved wooden gate stood closed. And, Zach guessed, locked pretty damned tight. The empty moat encircled the castle. Were they expecting the storm to fill it?

  What did the Hidden Hand know that Ronnie didn’t?

  * * *

  Amanda chewed on the edge of her thumbnail. Not very sanitary in the middle of a plague, but what the heck? She already had it, right? Dr. Henderson sat on the edge of her desk. His shoulders were slumped. A tall, proud man—nearly broken in half.

  He absently scratched his itching arm. Probably a boil. Amanda physically had to stop herself from taking her nails to her skin. The burning sensation was nearly undeniable. Her own throat, choked by her lymph nodes, expanded to the size of small lemons.

  “We should hear what he has to say,” Henderson declared.

  She shook her head. “How exactly is he going to explain that?

  Amanda indicated the five—count them, five—slides where they had reproduced the same effect. Each one came back positive. Devlin had preexposure antibodies. Not a whole lot of ways you could get those besides a vaccination.

  “Still,” Henderson said frowning before he paused. It seemed to take a moment to gather his strength back again. “He would know if he was vaccinated intentionally.”

  Amanda made sure to keep her face placid. This was one of those times that Jennifer would have stomped on her foot to speak up. Instead her assistant was in a near coma under the table. Amanda wanted to tell Henderson everything, but she feared how he would take it.

  She wasn’t sure how he would take her little texting adventure, and Amanda didn’t want to end up tied to a chair next to Devlin.

  “We’ve got to try,” Henderson stated as he stood up. The director leaned over Devlin. “If you scream…”

  Honestly, at this point, who would hear the CIA liaison, or more importantly, who would care? With everyone in various stages of the Black Death a mouthy operative was the least of their concerns.

&n
bsp; The CIA liaison nodded, so Henderson removed the gag.

  “I’m not the traitor; she is,” Devlin said, indicating Amanda.

  “See?” she said hoping she didn’t sound too guilty.

  Dr. Henderson eyed her then focused on Devlin. “How do you explain having active, IgM-type antibodies in your blood stream? Antibodies that take weeks to form?”

  “I have no idea,” Devlin asserted. “But I do know that she sent state secrets to an unknown party!”

  Amanda shrugged as Devlin went on to give the entire incriminating evidence. The guy did have a good memory—she had to give him that.

  Henderson turned to her. “Well?”

  She stuck to the facts as best she could. “When I realized that Jennifer and Devlin had been infected within the same time frame, and that his lymph nodes weren’t even enlarged, he attacked me. So, I defended myself.”

  Amanda hoped that was close enough to the story she had given Henderson when he walked in on her. By the cloud over his features he still wasn’t convinced, so she motioned toward the computer. “Check it yourself.”

  A little too quickly, he took her up on her offer.

  “Check for a upload link,” Devlin offered.

  Behind Henderson’s back, Amanda frowned at Devlin, which only fueled him more. “Plus, her phone. Check her phone for unauthorized numbers.”

  Her boss finished with the computer. “Nothing there. He’s right, though. I should check your phone as well.”

  Amanda had done an excellent job covering her tracks on the computer, but Jennifer’s phone? She’d been lucky to clear the call log.

  She handed over her phone, and then made a show of pulling out Jennifer’s as well. “Here are both of our phones.”

  Henderson sat down, squinting at the tiny screen. Finally he set both phones down. “They look clean.”

  “No. No. No. No.” The CIA liaison said thumping his chair forward then back. “You’ve got the wrong—”

  Her boss stuffed the gag back into Devlin’s mouth. With a deep sigh, Henderson slumped into a chair. “Now, what do we do with him?”

  Amanda felt her stomach drop. She had no idea what to do with Devlin, but she had assumed that Henderson would. “Tell someone at the CIA?”

  “Who, though?” Her boss postulated as he rubbed his temples. “How do we know they didn’t vaccinate Devlin and send him in?”

  “There’s got to be someone you trust, right?”

  Henderson was the director of Plum Island. He had to have connections. He had to know someone who could get the information to someone who could act on it. Amanda didn’t want to think that she had to rely solely on the person on the other side of a text to save the known world.

  * * *

  The time for gawking was over. Ronnie handed Zach a vest.

  “What’s this?” he asked.

  “Your bulletproof vest,” Ronnie answered, then turned to the pilot. “Bring us into the landing coordinates.”

  Zach held up what on the surface might look like a sweater vest. “This? This is bulletproof.”

  “Yep,” she said, pulling on hers, tucking it under her weighed down equipment belt. “Think of Kevlar, only we’ve added some metal ions to the mix.”

  “I still don’t get the ‘bulletproof’ part.”

  Ronnie kind of loved it when he got a Doubting Thomas on her. “Put it on.”

  After he donned the garment she flicked a finger at his chest. Which she should have known better than to do as her nail hit solid metal. “Ouch,” she said sucking on her stinging finger.

  Zach thumped his chest as well, then shaking out his hand. “How the hell…”

  “Just like the metal ions in the CIA’s device aligned under a microwave burst,” Ronnie explained, “these align under pressure. The more pressure, the more the ions bond.”

  “Creating a thicker and thicker shield?” Zach postulated.

  “Bingo,” she said as the pilot swooped down into a clearing near the castle and hovered over the landing spot. Ronnie turned to Francois. “You aren’t going to stay in the chopper like you promised are you?”

  The Frenchman cocked his head slightly. She tossed Francois a vest. Of course because she’d had to give her nice sleek black one to Zach, Ronnie was wearing Quirk’s, which of course had a prominent Hello Kitty on the front, which meant that Francois got the backup vest with Chococat. She and Francois were just going to have to deal with it.

  “We’re ready,” Ronnie informed the pilot.

  “I’m just going to touch down,” he answered. “Let you off-load the equipment, then dust off.”

  Yes, she had gotten used to his aversion of actually landing the chopper. Heaven forbid.

  * * *

  Francois helped lift a large disc from the helicopter as the helicopter’s rotors spun dizzyingly overhead, adding even more force to the storm’s pounding rain. Ronnie tossed a metal case over his head. It landed on the soaked grass and bounced. Yet other items Ronnie handed Francois with the reverence of a saintly relic.

  Next to him, Zach hauled a crate off the deck, and then stumbled back. Francois caught him by the elbow. Then he, too, felt a shifting underfoot. It could not be an earthquake—not this far north and not this close to stripping the Hidden Hand of all they held dear.

  Underfoot, large metal hooks ripped through the meadow waving in the air like so many heads of a snake.

  “Liftoff!” Zach yelled above the wash of the rotors.

  Ronnie responded, but the wind snatched away her words. Whether the pilot heard, or he attempted to get the helicopter in the air of his own accord, but the hooks latched onto the struts of the craft, jerking the craft back toward the ground.

  Zach pushed Francois to the ground as the helicopter tipped nearly on its side, bringing its swirling blades just inches from their heads. Crates, bundles, and computers tumbled from the open bay door. Above them, Ronnie clung to a cable. Then, she lost her grip and crashed beside them.

  “We’ve got to stay clear of the rotors,” she groaned, nursing the shoulder that she fell on.

  Francois could not agree more. Then, the helicopter tipped upright, as hooks from the other side brought it level. Trapped, but level. The pilot fought fiercely, testing the restraints on one side, and then the other.

  Zach tugged on one of the hooks. “They must be magnetized.”

  A strong, unseen force might have held them on. But one of the hooks broke, sending the helicopter tilting wildly to the side. At the least, the rotors were away from them as they scrambled to safety.

  But was it truly safe? Quirk cried out from the helicopter, “Incoming!”

  Through heavy raindrops, even Francois’ old eyes could make out at least six missiles heading their way. And with the helicopter flailing violently, they had a clear target.

  “The countermeasures!” Zach yelled, but Ronnie tugged them toward the tumble of equipment.

  “Find the EM rifle!”

  Zach complied, but Francois stared out across the soaked field, past the moatto the topmost turret. Lino would be watching from there—regardless of a veering helicopter or inbound missiles.

  Francois would not flinch.

  CHAPTER 30

  Cutler, Maine

  4:12 p.m., EST

  Zach ripped a crate open, revealing a bunch of what looked like ninja stars—but no rifles.

  “Here!” Ronnie yelled as she tossed him what seemed like a typical pump-action rifle. “You’ve got to aim pretty damn close for the EM pulse to work.”

  Her words sounded impossible. But which of her words had sounded reasonable? Trusting Ronnie, Zach wiped the rain from his eyes and swung the rifle up, targeting the nearest missile. He braced his back leg, ready for the recoil. Yet when he pulled the trigger, there was no more kick than a regular weapon. Did it work? Did the rifle actually shoot something?

  Then the missile pitched and wavered, sailing over the helicopter and crashing into the field, exploding in a brilliant red
flash. Zach couldn’t waste any time staring at the sight. He had five other missiles to take down. Pumping the rifle with one hand, he caught it with the other and aimed.

  Keeping both eyes open, he tracked the second missile and fired. It spun on its axis, narrowly missing the chopper before disappearing over the edge of the cliff. After pumping another shot, he turned to the third streaking toward them. Only this one came from the other side of the chopper.

  “Ronnie!”

  She looked up from her task to see the problem. If he shot, the chopper would be caught in the EM pulse. And as the helicopter bucked up and down and sideways, how could he get to the other side?

  “Hit the deck!” she yelled back.

  Zach didn’t understand what she meant until he did as requested. Once on the ground, he realized what she meant. He might not be able to shoot over or around the helicopter, but under? Under, he could do. Zach fired a third time, sending the missile off into the woods to unleash its destruction.

  Not having time to rise, Zach rolled to his left, targeting another incoming missile.

  Four down. Two to go.

  * * *

  Ronnie tilted the gopher, trying to get the damned thing to work. Their hybrid ground penetrating radar and electronic disrupter was not fairing well in its first field test. She could see the hook’s controlling mechanism beneath about three feet of dirt. Could she disrupt it? No.

  She tried everything. Using energy bursts. Low-frequency modulation. Even a high pitched sound blast, yet those damn hooks still held the helicopter in thrall. Inside the craft, she could see the pilot struggling and Quirk hanging on for dear life in the co-pilot’s seat.

  Nothing was happening as it was supposed to. And it was all her fault. Again.

  She’d underestimated Lino. She should have known that he would know the best place to land for a frontal assault. Okay, so maybe the whole magnetized hooks thing she shouldn’t feel bad about missing, but still. If she didn’t get ahead of the curve…