Polar Shift

by Clive Cussler

  “The key is in the door,” Karla said without thinking.

  “That’s the one! It seemed obvious, almost too obvious,” Barrett said, “but Kovacs was a scientist who would have been obsessed with precision. It would have been more precise for him to have said that the key is in the lock.”

  “The key was in the word door itself,” Austin said.

  “That was my thinking,” Barrett said. “Door became my key word. You have to look at code breaking in a couple of ways. At one level, you’re dealing with the mechanics of things, such as word or letter transpositions and substitutions. At another level, you’re looking at the meaning of things.” Seeing his explanation greeted with blank looks, he said, “What does a door do?”

  “That’s easy,” Karla said. “It separates one room from another. You have to open and close it to pass through.”

  “Correct,” Barrett said. “The word’s opening letter is D.”

  He grabbed a clean napkin and with his ballpoint pen wrote:

  DEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ

  ABC

  “This sets the pattern of letters for the plain alphabet. I took the last letter in door and used it in the same configuration for the cipher alphabet.”

  “Let me try,” Karla said. Taking the pen, she wrote:

  RSTUVWXYZABCDEFGHIJKLMN

  OPQ

  “I’m buying you a ticket to Bletchley Park,” Barrett said, referring to the British code-breaking headquarters during World War II.

  “Using the alphabets to write the word message, you’d still get gibberish.” Karla stared at the word with disappointment in her eyes.

  “Your grandfather didn’t want to make it too easy. I came up with the same result. Then I went back to the key word. D and R are four spaces apart in the word door. I wrote down every fourth word in the main verse, but my gut feeling told me that it was too much. So I tried every fourth letter. Still nothing I could sink my teeth in. Then I thought, D and R are fifteen letters apart in the alphabet. I used that formula in the poem and picked out every fifteenth word. Then I used the plain and cipher alphabets to attempt the cryptanalysis. Are you still with me?”

  “No,” Austin said.

  “Yeah, that’s what happened to me too,” Barrett said with a grin. “So I cheated. I ran the whole bloody mess through a computer.” He reached into his jacket pocket and produced a computer printout. “This is what I got.”

  “A mishmash of vowels and consonants, but no words,” Karla said.

  “I tried everything. I called up an MIT professor who spoke Hungarian and ran it by him. No go. Then I remembered Kovacs spoke Romanian, and called up a guy who runs the Transylvania Restaurant back in Seattle. He couldn’t make heads nor tails of it. I would have torn my hair out, if I had any. I went back to the words that I had discarded, particularly turvy-topsy. I thought maybe it applied to what I was doing.”

  “How could you turn the message upside down?” Karla said with skepticism.

  “I couldn’t. But I could interpret the words loosely, and run it backward, like the second line of the poem. Which is what I did. Still didn’t make sense. Then I had an epiphany. As I rode around on my bike, I realized that it wasn’t supposed to be words. It was exactly what it was, a string of letters, more or less. Once I jumped that hurdle, I figured that there were numbers in the message as well. Back to the computer. Certain letters were indicators that meant the next letter was actually a number. A preceded by another letter equals 1, B equals 2 and so on.”

  “You’ve lost me again,” Austin said. From the puzzled look on Karla’s face, she was wandering around in cipher land as well.

  Barrett set the computer page aside and picked up the napkin in both hands. “This is an equation.”

  “An equation for what?” Austin said.

  “By itself, the message doesn’t make sense, but we’ve got to look at it in context. Kovacs intended that the message would be seen by only one person: Karla. He said she would always have the poem when you needed it.”

  “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Austin said.

  “I just figured this out a few minutes ago, so I can’t be sure until I put it to the test,” Barrett said. “But Kovacs could have given us a set of electromagnetic frequencies.”

  “The antidote,” Karla whispered.

  Austin gingerly picked up the napkin as if it would fall apart. “This is the frequency that can neutralize a polar shift?”

  Barrett’s Adam’s apple bobbed a couple of times “Hell, I hope so,” he said.

  Karla leaned over and kissed Barrett on the top of his bald head. “You’ve done it.”

  Barrett looked downhearted for someone who had saved the world. “Maybe. I’m afraid we don’t have much time.”

  “What do you mean?” Austin said.

  “After our meeting, I listened to the phone conversations transmitted by the electronic bug you planted on Gant’s estate. He and Margrave talked. They’ve left the country by now.”

  “Damn,” Austin said. “Where did they go?”

  “I don’t know. Margrave never got around to telling me the plans for the final phase. But it’s not where I’m worried about, but what. I think they’re about to put their plans for a polar reversal into effect.”

  “Any estimate on how long we have?”

  “Hard to tell,” Barrett said. “The target location is in the South Atlantic. I wasn’t in on the final discussions, so I don’t know the exact spot. Once they’re on-site, it’s only a matter of hours before they pull the switch.”

  Austin handed the napkin back to Barrett. “Can this equation be translated into something we can use to actually neutralize the reversal?”

  “Sure. The same way E = mc2 was translated into the Bomb and nuclear power. All you need are the resources and the time.”

  “You’ll get all the resources you need. How long will you need to build something that will do the job?”

  “I’ll need help. I provided the engineering and made the scale model for the trigger device, but others worked on the actual construction.”

  “I’ll get you help. How long?”

  Barrett gave him a bleak smile. “Seventy-two hours. Maybe.”

  “I think I heard you say thirty-six,” Austin said. “How big will this device be?”

  “Really big,” Barrett said. “You saw the setup on the transmitter ship.”

  “Ouch,” Austin said. His unshakable confidence wavered for a second, but his agile mind was already cranking into gear. “What do you do with this thing once you get it built?”

  “It has to transmit electromagnetic waves covering roughly the same area as the polar shift.” He shook his head. “We’re going to have to figure out how to transport the neutralizer to the target area. Damn. I feel so responsible for this whole mess.”

  Despite Barrett’s biker appearance, he had a fragile psyche. Austin saw that guilt was tearing the brilliant computer whiz apart, and if that happened he would be of no use.

  “Then I can’t think of anyone who would be better at cleaning it up. Leave the transportation to me. I’ve got an idea that might work.”

  He rose from his chair and put some bills down on the table for the beers. As they left the tavern, Austin saw Spider head toward his motorcycle and said, “Where are you going?”

  “To ride my bike.”

  “I’ll have someone pick it up,” Austin said, taking him by the arm. “Too dangerous.”

  Karla grabbed Barrett by the other arm, and they steered him to the Jeep. On the way back to Washington, Austin got on his cell phone, called Zavala and said he had an important job for him to do.

  “I’ll get right on it,” Zavala said after hearing the details. “I talked to the Trouts. Good news. They traced the transmitter ship to Rio via satellite and are on their way.”

  LESS THAN an hour later, Austin pulled into the NUMA parking garage with Barrett and Karla and they took the elevator to the third floor. The corridors wer
e silent and dark except for a shaft of light coming from the study next to the conference room. Zavala had brought Hibbet in as Austin had requested.

  Austin said, “Thanks for coming, Alan. Sorry for yanking you here a second time, but we need your help.”

  “I meant it when I told you to call night or day if you needed me. Is there anything new since we talked the last time?”

  “We’ve confirmed that the whirlpool and giant waves were side effects of an experiment in causing a polar reversal. And that the magnetic reversal could trigger a geologic reversal with catastrophic implications for the world.”

  Hibbet’s face turned ashen. “Is there any way to stop this from happening?”

  Austin’s lips tightened in a thin smile. “I’m hoping that you can tell us.”

  “Me? I don’t understand.”

  “This is Spider Barrett,” Austin said. “He designed the mechanism to trigger a polar reversal.”

  Hibbet glanced at the sad-faced Barrett and his tattooed head. He’d been around long enough to know that the sciences attracted its share of oddballs. He extended his hand. “Brilliant work.”

  Barrett beamed at the professional recognition. “Thanks.”

  Austin sensed an instant synergy between the two men. “We want you to work with Spider, Joe and Karla to build an antenna capable of neutralizing the low-level electromagnetic waves that are being used to create a polar shift.”

  “Building the antenna won’t be a problem. It’s nothing but metal and wire. But you could use it to hang laundry, for all the good it would do without the correct frequencies that would act to buffer those being used to stir things up.”

  Karla smiled and slipped a folded sheet of paper from her blouse. Using infinite care, she unfolded the paper and slid it across the table to Hibbet. He picked the napkin up and frowned as he read the equation written on it. Then the light of understanding dawned in his eyes.

  “Where did you get this?” he said in a whisper.

  “My grandfather,” Karla said.

  “Karla’s grandfather was Lazlo Kovacs,” Austin said. “He encoded his work before he passed it down. Thanks to Spider, we’ve figured it out. Now that we’ve done all the hard work, can you build us an antenna?”

  “Yes,” Hibbet said. “At least, I think I can.”

  “That’s good enough for us. Tell us what you need. You’ve got all the resources of the U.S. government behind you.”

  Hibbet laughed and shook his head. “That’s a lot better than dealing with the NUMA bean counters. You don’t know the trouble I’ve had trying to buy experimental equipment.” He paused in thought. “Even if I can whip something together, we’ll still need a platform to carry it to where it would do the most good.”

  “How big would this contraption be?” Austin said.

  “Big,” Hibbet said. “Then you’d need the generators to power the antenna. And a way to transport something that weighs tons.”

  “That’s the bad news,” Austin said.

  “What’s the good news?” asked Hibbet.

  Austin grinned. “Necessity is the mother of invention.”

  The phone rang just then and Austin picked it up. Pitt must have pulled some major strings. The Pentagon was sending a car over to pick him up.

  THE EARTH seemed to be on fire in a hundred different places. Volcanoes erupted like a virulent disease, spewing forth huge, glowing lava fields whose smoke cast a thick pall over the planet. Wind storms of unimaginable power whipped the massive cloud into twisting vortexes that ranged across continents. Tsunamis slammed into the North American coastline on the east and the west and created a narrow continent squeezed by two angry oceans.

  Then the image of the ravaged planet disappeared. The large screen in the Pentagon screening room went blank. Lights that had been dimmed for the presentation went back on, to reveal Austin and the stunned faces of a dozen or so military brass and political people who were sitting around a long conference table.

  “The computer simulation you just saw was prepared by Dr. Paul Trout, a computer graphics expert at NUMA,” Austin said. “It presents a reasonably accurate picture of the consequences of a geologic polar shift.”

  A four-star general sitting across from Austin said, “I would be the first to admit that was a frightening picture, if it’s true. But as you say, it’s a computer simulation, and could just as well be based on imagination as fact.”

  “I wish it were imagination, General. We didn’t have time to prepare a written summary, so you’ll have to bear with me while I lay out the main points of what we’re dealing with here. The first link in the chain of events that led to this meeting was forged more than sixty years ago with the work of a brilliant electrical engineer named Lazlo Kovacs.”

  For more than an hour, Austin laid out the timeline, touching on Tesla, Kovacs’s escape from East Prussia and the electromagnetic warfare experiments conducted by the U.S. and the Soviets. He described his meeting with Barrett, the man who had translated the theorems into reality, the ship-sinking ocean disturbances and the plans to initiate a polar shift. Austin was aware of the fantastic nature of his story, so he left out a few details. Had he not seen them with his eyes he would never have believed in the existence of dwarf mammoths in a crystal city locked in an ancient volcano.

  Even without the more unbelievable details, he faced a wall of skepticism. Austin made his case with the skill of a powerhouse attorney talking to a jury, but he knew he would be peppered with questions. An assistant secretary representing the Department of Defense cut Austin short when he was describing Jordan Gant’s involvement with Margrave.

  “You’ll have to excuse me if I find it hard to believe that the head of a nonprofit organization and the billionaire owner of a respected software company are in cahoots to cause this so-called polar shift over some vague neo-anarchist cause.”

  “You can argue about specifics,” Austin said, “but this is far from a vague cause. Lucifer used the bright lights of Broadway to send its message to the world and shut down New York City as a warning. I think 9/11 proved that you ignore seemingly lunatic warnings at your peril.”

  “Where are these so-called transmitter ships?” asked a naval officer.

  “Rio de Janeiro,” Austin replied.

  “You said there were four ships earlier but one sank?”

  “That’s right. We assumed that a replacement ship would be built, but we found no sign of it, so we’re assuming they’re going ahead with the trio.”

  “This should be a slam dunk,” the assistant secretary said. “I suggest we send the closest submarine to keep track of these ships, and if they engage in suspicious behavior we sink them.”

  “What about diplomatic considerations?” the four-star general asked. “Shoot first and ask questions later on the high seas?”

  “It would be no different than shooting down a civilian airliner targeting the White House or Congress,” the secretary said. “Can we do it?” he asked the naval officer.

  “The navy likes a challenge,” he said.

  “Then that’s the plan. I’ll run it by the secretary of defense and we can get the ball rolling. He’ll brief the president when he gets back tomorrow.” He turned to Austin. “Thanks for bringing this to our attention.”

  “I’m not through,” Austin said. “There’s reason to believe we have something that will neutralize the polar shift. We may have found an antidote.”

  Every eye in the room stared at him.

  “What sort of antidote?” the general asked more out of politeness than interest.

  “It’s a set of electromagnetic frequencies that we think will counter the polar reversal.”

  “How do you plan to administer this ‘antidote’?” the assistant secretary said, “with a big spoon?”

  “I’ve got a few ideas.”

  “The only antidote I’d like to use is a torpedo right up their butt,” the naval officer said.

  Everyone in the room except for Au
stin roared with laughter.

  “Don’t mean to be impolite,” the assistant secretary said. “Why don’t you work your ideas into a report and get it to my secretary.”

  The meeting was over. As Austin was ushered through the labyrinth of corridors, he remembered his meeting with Gant, and his impression that he was not someone whose duplicity should be underestimated.

  Slam dunk, my ass, he thought.

  39

  THE TROUTS HAD BOOKED a beachside hotel room with a balcony that overlooked the harbor and offered an unimpeded view of the distant shipping docks. Since arriving in Rio, they had taken turns sitting on the balcony watching the transmitter ships.

  Trout brought Gamay a cold glass of orange juice and pulled up a chair beside her. “Anything happening?”

  Gamay raised the binoculars to her eyes and studied a long shipping dock on the other side of the harbor. “The transmitter ships haven’t moved an inch since we got here.”

  Trout borrowed the binoculars and inspected three ships tied up parallel to the dock.

  “Did you notice that the liner is gone?”

  “It was there yesterday. They must have left before we got up this morning.”

  Gamay had wondered what a passenger ship was doing in a cargo vessel area. They had read the name painted on the stern: Polar Adventure. But neither one of them had given the vessel much thought. They had been more interested in the three cargo ships, which were named Polaris I, II and III, after the northern pole star.

  “I think we should take a closer look,” Paul said.

  “My thoughts exactly. I’m about ready to go for a ride.”