Kill Switch

by James Phelan

  Walker knocked. Waited. Looked at Monica. She was quiet, nervy at the thought of seeing an old family friend for the first time in years.

  “Maybe he’s out,” she said.

  Walker knocked again, and then they heard noise from within. Then silence. Walker looked up and saw a tiny camera in the corner above the door. A bolt sliding.

  Paul Conway answered the door. His eyes were on Walker, then Monica, then back to Walker.

  He had a hunting rifle in his hands. Loose, pointed at the doorjamb but for the time he jostled back from the lock.

  Walker drew his Colt .45. Aimed it center-mass.

  Paul’s eyes settled on it. Then his body went slack. He looked at Monica then Walker, and back at her, searching.

  “Monica,” Paul said. “I knew someone would come—but you? And this guy? Why—how—”

  “We need to talk about her brother,” Walker said. “And time’s ticking.”

  His face fell. He looked from them to the street. Walker’s car, clearly not government issue. He uncocked the rifle’s breach, ejecting the shell into his hand, and passed the rifle to Walker, who stood it just inside the front door.

  “You . . .” Paul looked to them both, and then he closed his eyes and shook his head. “You shouldn’t have come here.”

  48

  Paul Conway, formerly Leroy Craven, was dressed in shorts and T-shirt. Five-seven, 170 pounds, hair tucked behind his ears and ending just above his collar, beard grown out a little beyond neatly trimmed. Wired eyes like he hadn’t slept in a while.

  “I can’t have this!” He ran inside, leaving the front door open. He opened the door to a coat-room-cum-cupboard, and reached inside.

  Walker took two strides inside and caught Paul’s wrist. He held it tight. Walker had it in him to squeeze hard enough to crush bones and tendons and split muscle and skin; if the guy struggled and tried to pull another firearm, he just might do that.

  But Paul wasn’t reaching for a gun. He pointed with his free hand.

  The junction box. Tucked inside the cupboard.

  “The cameras,” he said. “This house is wired up the wazoo. Everything gets recorded. Security.”

  Walker let him go and watched as Paul flicked the mains switch. The television Walker could see from the entrance went black.

  “You’re on the run?” Paul said to them.

  Monica opened her mouth but then stopped and looked to Walker.

  “We’re working off the grid,” Walker said.

  Paul shook his head. “Grid? What—you think not carrying a phone will keep you dark? That it will somehow save you? When’s the last time you stopped and paid for gas or bought a coffee?”

  Walker looked to Monica.

  “In town?” Paul said.

  He could see the answer in Walker’s eyes.

  “Shit.”

  And with that, Paul was on the move. He spoke as he ran upstairs: “We’ve got minutes, not hours, until they’re on to you!” Paul shouted. “Until they’re here!”

  Walker turned to Monica. She seemed no less tense as she crossed her arms and entered the house. She looked about, poked her head into the rec room and took in the big-screen TV, surround sound, massive leather recliner in pride of place for serious gaming time, a couple of couches against the walls, bookshelves full of paperbacks and movies and games. No photos. Walker followed her through to the kitchen and watched as she opened the refrigerator, inspected it, closed it. Finally she seemed part-way satisfied.

  At the sound of noise out the front, Walker moved up the hallway, his boots squeaky on the polished flagstones. He saw the car: an SUV; huge thing—a Tucson, an off-white color. It sped by and pulled into a driveway halfway down the street. A woman got out, went to the rear door and lifted an infant out of a capsule.

  “Okay, let’s move,” Paul said, coming down the stairs, dressed in jeans and sneakers and a sweater, a small backpack over his shoulder. “Like, now.”

  Walker was already out the door, the keys to the Cuda in his hand.

  “Nope,” Paul said, heading to the side door of his garage. “That car’s burned. They’ll have images of it, and of you two in it, from all over the place. We’ll take mine.”

  Walker looked at the car that he’d driven from Mexico the day before. He paused and considered pocketing the keys. He looked at them in his hand, the single key on the NASA key ring—and then he tossed them into the tall prairie grass under Paul’s front windows.

  “Sad to see it go?” Monica asked him as they went through to the garage.

  “I’ll come back for it, soon enough,” Walker said.

  “I’m not a betting man,” Paul said, walking through his garage past a Toyota Prius and toward a big truck covered in a tarp. “But if you guys are being pursued by the NSA, as I’m suspecting you are, then they’re going to have that car impounded. And they’re going to be coming after you with what might as well be the eyes and ears and wrath of God.”

  Paul pulled the tarp off to reveal a jacked-up twin-cab truck that had seen far better days. The tires were big off-road things. The windows were after-market tinted and were bubbled with age and a job done cheaply. It had a snorkel air intake, a winch on the front nudge bar, and Nevada plates.

  “This vehicle’s registered in another name,” Paul said, chucking his backpack in the back passenger cab seat. “You two get in there, and stay down until we’re well out of town.”

  “Trapwire,” Walker said.

  “That’s right,” Paul replied. “And I’ve heard rumors about some other mass-surveillance program too. You two will be lit up like Christmas trees right now, got it?”

  He went to the driver’s seat, got in and started the engine. It turned over straightaway and had the unmistakable sound of a big diesel. But a modern diesel, not original to the truck. Again, after-market drop-in. Maybe one of the VW diesels that got sold super cheap after their emissions cheating scandal. A bug-out car, ready to roll. Walker saw in the back of the truck another gas tank. Long range—they could probably get over a thousand miles if they had to.

  “Twelve hundred miles,” Paul said, seeing Walker calculating. “Far enough to get anywhere I’d need to.”

  “Where are we headed now?” Walker said as he and Monica climbed in the back.

  Paul hit the gas, drove out of the garage and down the drive and then headed north. “As far as I need to go to drop you guys out of town and let the heat die down.”

  “We need your help to find Jasper,” Monica said. “You can—”

  “I can’t get involved. Just let this play out,” Paul said. “Maybe it won’t be as bad as you think.”

  “This is legit,” Walker said. “And your reaction to us turning up, and now bugging out, proves that you think it’s worse than you’re trying to tell yourself.”

  “It might not pan out like the news outlets are suggesting,” Paul said after a few moments of contemplation. Walker could see that he was conflicted in all kinds of ways. “It’s basically whoever has Jasper versus the world. It can’t end as big as they think.”

  “Why do you say that?” Walker asked.

  “These hacks? A lot of the most vital systems in this country are near-to impenetrable,” Monica said. “Especially to one guy, in this case Jasper, working over thirty-six hours.”

  “They’ve probably planned this for a while, whoever has him,” Walker said.

  “Impenetrable,” repeated Paul. “Nothing is. Humans are behind it. Once things go Quantum AI, sure, but that’s not here yet, so there are ways in and around. You hack the right person, they become the malware. And if they’re the person you need, then you’re in the system you need. Right?”

  Monica said, “Then who can we hack to find Jasper?”

  “No one. I’ve hacked a bunch of people. Not lately, but they’re still in there, in the system, higher up the food chain now. Whatever we want, I can get in. But not from back there,” Paul motioned over his shoulder toward home. “Here’s too
hot. If you’re here, they won’t be far behind.”

  “Who’s they?” Walker said.

  “The men in black. They go around in black cars and black helicopters. They own the night and they can make the day night too. And we can’t do it in town.”

  “Then where?”

  Paul checked his rearview mirror and kept his foot firmly planted on the gas pedal. “I know a place.”

  49

  Walker and Monica were on the rear bench of the truck, a blanket pulled over them. The ride was choppy, side to side, as Paul navigated out of town and took corners, but on the highway it was calm.

  “Five more minutes and you guys can get up,” Paul called out.

  Monica was facing forward. Walker was behind her, his back against the back of the bench seat. His left arm was around her, to keep her from spilling off the seat. The top of her head was under his chin, and he felt the heels of her boots against the front of his ankles. Her left arm was looped over his, and her hand held his wrist. It was near black under the blanket. Monica felt warm. Her hair smelled of citrus shampoo. She turned her head so her face was turned up toward his.

  “You think he’s going to just ditch us someplace?” she asked in a whisper.

  “He might try, but we need to talk to him first,” Walker replied.

  “He seems paranoid.”

  “He’s got good reason,” Walker said, his voice quiet under the blanket. “And he’s right. We were careless, with using your card before. You can’t underestimate these guys. Paranoia is their default position.”

  “So what if whoever is behind us catches up with us? Why can’t we talk to them, work with them?”

  “The guys from your house didn’t strike me as wanting to sit around and have a chat types.”

  “They might have wanted you, not me. I mean, they don’t know your motive here. Maybe they had surveillance on me, to protect me, thought of that? I mean, if they knew you wanted to help—”

  “It’d be far too late. Those guys back at your place are out to scoop up anyone they see as a threat or involved in this and they won’t be persuaded to accept help from the outside. Certainly not before it’s too late, and we’ve reached the thirty-six-hour mark.”

  “But do you think that Paul can be persuaded to help us find Jasper?”

  “I think he’s our best and near to our only shot at making a difference, to getting to your brother, to stopping what’s coming.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “What if you can’t persuade him?”

  “I doubt I can.”

  “But you just said . . . oh. I have to do it.”

  50

  “You can get up now,” Paul called.

  Walker flicked off the blanket. Monica scooted across the bench, behind Paul, leaving Walker behind the empty passenger seat. The car was still coasting along a two-lane highway. Blacktop, patchy. Not the interstate, Walker noted. Something north-by-northwest. The road had a slow gradient. They were going up, the truck easily doing sixty. In this particular truck they could drive all the way to Yellowstone without stopping. Probably further.

  “I’d ask how you found me,” Paul said, his eyes not leaving the view ahead. “But it wouldn’t be too hard to do, even for an amateur. If one was trying to find me. If they knew my new name.”

  “You weren’t trying not to be found,” Monica pointed out.

  “I’m guessing you could have done that pretty well, Paul,” Walker added. “Building layers of protection around your new ID?”

  Paul nodded. “The question is, Monica, why were you looking for me? Before this thing with Jasper?”

  Monica, silent, stared at the back of his head.

  “You had to change your name, because you’ve got a record,” Walker said.

  Paul glanced at him in the rearview mirror.

  “You needed to move on, get a decent job,” Walker said, “so you bought or created your new ID.”

  The glance became a longer look. “Who are you?” Paul said slowly but clearly.

  “Jed Walker.”

  “I mean who, not a name. Who do you work for?”

  “Myself. I’m helping Monica find her brother so that we can stop these cyber attacks. I’m an old friend.”

  Paul adjusted the mirror slightly so he could get Monica into view.

  “That true, Mon?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you trust this guy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  Monica looked at Walker, then back at Paul’s reflection in the mirror.

  “Because he’s helping me, and no one else is.”

  “What about the FBI?” Paul said. “Surely they’d have reached out to you straightaway.”

  “Yeah, right. They did. They wanted me to stay indoors with Dad. Wait this out. Watch it, see what comes, sit on our hands. All while someone had Jasper—have you seen it? How they have him? What they make him say and do?”

  Paul was silent but he nodded. He overtook a refrigerated truck without slowing. The road ahead stretched to the horizon, tilting up to a blue sky.

  “Whoever has him will—”

  “Monica,” Paul said firmly. “I really don’t care much for Jasper, right? I mean, he was in contact a couple of years back, and then he did the same old cut and run. Fool me once, right? Damn . . .”

  “How can you say that?” Monica said, sitting forward on the bench and looking closely at him.

  “Mon, do you know what Jasper and I were doing? The government was what we were fighting against in the first place. All those hours and days and weeks and months—working to dismantle what they were doing. And then he joined them.”

  “And look where that got him, right?” Monica said. She let it hang in the air a moment, then added, “Do you think he deserves what’s happening to him?”

  Walker waited to hear an answer but none came. Monica sat back. She was looking down at her hands, wringing them and clutching them, fidgeting with bottled-up anger and angst.

  “I’ll tell you this much for free,” Paul said. “For all Jasper’s faults, he’s patriotic. The last time I spoke to him, he was still at the NSA. When he got there he was in the Global Communications Department. All of the covert sites and cover-sites all networked through Fort Meade and Langley. He reached out to me to do some white-hat penetration—he said he couldn’t believe the vulnerabilities in the systems. And they were there—I could read comms in less than ten minutes if I knew an internal email address within the given department. The NSA were great at coding and crypto but shit at tech. They were using off-the-shelf software and hardware that had all kinds of vulnerabilities—and this is at the Top Secret level. The work I did with him got him a commendation and promotion, and he went off to Berlin for a six-month posting. He offered me an assistant role; he didn’t realize that it was too late for me. Government work’s out of the question. Fine for him, right?”

  “Do you know what he was working on in Berlin?” Walker asked.

  He nodded. “We spoke, for the last time it turns out, four months into that tour. He rang me one night—we spoke for hours, until dawn my time. He was drunk, which was rare for him—”

  “He doesn’t drink,” interrupted Monica.

  Paul paused, as if deciding how much to tell her. “He did, sometimes. And over there, he told me he was doing a lot of it. They all did. It’s how they operated.”

  “Drinking didn’t agree with him,” Monica said to Walker.

  “Berlin . . . there were always big gatherings of delegates from industry. One week banking, the other mining, pharmaceuticals, tech, you name it. He made friends with a bunch of the CIA officers working out of the embassy on the Casanova Project. Heard of it?”

  “No,” Monica said.

  “Recruiting,” Walker said. “Through nefarious means.”

  “Recruiting for what?” Monica asked.

  “Look,” said Walker. “I worked for the government, and I mean worke
d . . .” His voice reverberated around the cab of the truck and settled like a thick fog. “For a long time. Pointy-end stuff in all the messed-up places that you can think of. And I got out, because they burned me. I settled that score. Jasper’s part of the machine, like I was. He deserves our help.”

  Paul looked at Walker’s eyes in the mirror and said, “Hate the player, not the game?”

  “You’ve got it backward,” Walker said. “Hate the league. The guys calling the shots. Sure, fine, I get that. But those in the arena—shit. And besides it all—whether we like Jasper or not, we need to do what we can to find him and stop him. If he melts down a nuclear plant or diverts air traffic control into chaos . . .” Walker leaned forward, his forearms on the back of the front seat, his weight making it creak and tip back a couple of inches. “What’s vital here is that we don’t get to see what’s going to happen at the thirty-six-hour mark. And all that happens before that. You get me? We have to give it a shot.”

  Paul’s hands on the steering wheel relaxed. His jaw too. He looked out his side window at the basin of the wide valley spreading out below. The highway cut through it in place of a river. Bone dry, but for the houses and their insatiable appetite for brought-in water.

  Paul said, “You want to know what I saw when I saw Jasper on the screen last night? I saw a dead man.”

  51

  Harrington’s team cleared Paul’s house. The help was hovering overhead, waiting to launch a pursuit should Walker start up the Cuda.

  But they needn’t have worried.

  Walker, Monica and Paul had gone.

  Harrington stood outside on the street, where the rappelling ropes were discarded from the chopper. Kent and his team’s junior soldier, a tall lanky guy named Angelo, joined him.

  “What now?” Kent asked.

  “Get the ropes,” Harrington said, and pointed down the road where it widened at an intersection. “Have the help pick us up there. They can’t be far.”

  •

  “You thought that too, right?” Paul said. He was looking at Walker in the rearview mirror, waiting for a response.