The Second Ship Page 29

  In a wonderful departure from what you would normally expect from a boy his age, Raul listened to her with an easiness that showed he didn’t feel he had to prove himself to her. And that allowed him to actually hear what she was saying. Even his strongly held religious beliefs built no wall between them. In fact, when Heather had asked to attend one of Raul’s Bible study sessions, he had laughed but demurred, telling her that he just wouldn’t feel right pushing his beliefs on her. It gave Heather a warm feeling inside to be around someone who had such a perfect understanding of who he was.

  But this was a new Saturday, and there was no time for more than fleeting thoughts of school, basketball tournaments, or even Raul. Heather had barely gotten to sleep last night. After all, today was the day.

  Heather had even begged off on the family shopping trip to Santa Fe, saying the science project demanded her full attention today. Although her mother had looked skeptical, her dad had understood. A science project was a science project. Heather had not even had to lie, except by omission.

  Today was the day when she, Jennifer, and Mark would become the first humans to tap into the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network, or SIPRNet as it was more commonly known, via an undetectable subspace signal. Actually, that wasn’t quite right. The subspace signal could be detected, but only if you had a correctly tuned subspace receiver, something that was pretty unlikely.

  Heather was so excited she could barely contain herself. If all went according to plan, they could generate a remote digital signal on any line in the world, assuming they could attain the exact four-dimensional coordinates for that line. And that went for fiber-optic lines as readily as wired networks.

  That concept was truly magical: In an optical fiber line, light carried the information instead of an electrical signal, as in a wire line. But in the subspace to normal space interface, there was no difference in the way either signal was generated. It was delicious. The NSA was about to get quite a shock.

  It was no great surprise for Heather to discover that Mark and Jennifer were already gathered around the computerized control system for their subspace transmitter by the time she entered the Smythe garage. Her two friends huddled under the tall halogen lamp that provided indirect illumination to the work area.

  Heather slid into the folding chair beside Jennifer, a spot she had come to think of as the copilot’s seat. As Jennifer’s fingers danced across the keyboard of the laptop, gradually bringing the cold fusion tank online, Heather monitored the output indicators. So long as everything stayed within projected norms, she just had to help with the tuning of the subspace wave steering.

  Mark was on call with his language skills. Since seeing Jack deal with the Rag Man, Mark had become fascinated with spy agencies. He had read everything he could find on the subject and had also determined to understand the technical side of remotely tapping into the SIPRNet.

  “So we’re going to tap into one of the lines directly inside the Puzzle Palace?” Mark asked.

  “That’s the plan,” said Heather. “We have the coordinates for the building on Ft. Meade, but picking a line is going to take us a while.”

  “From what I read, all of the SIPRNet lines will be shielded in TEMPEST-rated facilities.”

  Jennifer raised her head. “What is TEMPEST?”

  Mark turned back toward his sister. “It’s a code word used to describe the way secure systems have to be shielded so that the electromagnetic signals they give off can’t be monitored remotely.”

  “Yes,” said Heather. “Even typing on a keyboard produces little electronic signals that leak out into the surrounding space. They are weak, but if someone has the right equipment, they can pick up the signal and find out exactly what you were typing. The same thing applies for all electronic equipment.”

  Mark nodded. “So, TEMPEST-rated facilities have special requirements, like being wrapped with metal or wire mesh that blocks those electromagnetic signals from escaping.”

  “But that won’t cause us any problem,” said Heather. “Every signal has a tiny leakage into subspace, and no TEMPEST countermeasures will stop that. We’ll be able to pick up the signals from any network once we narrow in on a specific line and pick up the data flowing across it. We only need a tunable subspace receiver for that.

  “But putting a signal back on the remote line is what requires all this power and the subspace transmitter. And since we’re the only ones with a subspace receiver-transmitter, we’re the only ones that can do this.”

  Jennifer glanced at her readings. “Power levels at seventy-seven percent. Now eighty.”

  Heather leaned in closer. “Okay. Nice and steady.”

  “Eighty-five.”

  “Keep it coming.”

  “Ninety-three.”

  “Okay now, ease off a bit. Steady up at around ninety-eight and let it stabilize.”

  “Got it. Coming up on ninety-six now. All right. Ninety-seven. Backing down a bit more on the stimulation. There it is, ninety-eight and holding steady.”

  Heather stared at the displays for several seconds before she was satisfied. “Ever so slowly now, nudge it up that last two percent.”

  For almost two minutes Jennifer worked the keyboard, making incremental adjustments to the reaction controlling signal strength. On the side of the tank, the banks of colored LED lights twinkled as data cascaded through the various registers in the central processing unit. As Jennifer watched that, Heather focused on the computer monitor. Perfect.

  The sound from the cold fusion apparatus was surprisingly loud. This occurred because the reaction produced heat, and that heat produced steam, which in turn they siphoned off to drive a steam-powered electric generator. The generator itself only produced a whirring sound, but the steam whistled out with a sound reminiscent of a teakettle.

  “You know, that is really getting to be annoying,” said Mark.

  “I agree,” said Jennifer. “We’re going to have to come up with a better design for the steam recycler or we’ll go deaf.”

  “We just have to put up with it a little while,” said Heather. “Just long enough for us to find a SIPRNet line and put the message on it.”

  They didn’t actually need the electricity the project generated, just the gamma ray flux. But since the purpose of the science project was to provide a household energy source driven by cold fusion, they had to have that part of it. Besides, there had to be a means of dumping the excess heat that cold fusion generated, and the state transition of liquid water to steam was a good way of doing that.

  Heather read off the latitude and longitude of the Puzzle Palace, allowing a few extra seconds for Jennifer to synchronize the system with Greenwich Mean Time via a remote time server.

  Despite having an accurate coordinate for the building, their difficulty was going to lie in the massive amount of electronic systems inside. When they tuned their subspace receiver to that spot, the close proximity of computer systems and network cabling would make it hard to find a particular one, at least the first time.

  On the plus side, it didn’t really matter which subnet they accessed within the Puzzle Palace, so long as it was a SIPRNet. Since almost everything in the building was classified, that was not going to be hard to find.

  “Got one.” The excitement in Jennifer’s voice crackled like static on a New Mexico AM radio station.

  “How’s the signal strength?” Mark asked.

  “Beautiful. And the power grid is stable too. Give me just a second to confirm the subnet's SIPRNet status.”

  Jennifer’s fingers danced across the keyboard as a stream of data scrolled through a window on the monitor and lit the LED panel like a Christmas tree at the North Pole.

  Jennifer leaned back, beaming. “That’s it. We’re in.”

  Heather took a deep breath. Oh, Jesus. They had really done it.

  “Okay, putting a test sync pattern on the network.” Jennifer typed a quick command. “I’ve got confirmation. The pattern has been successfully upli
nked to the SIPRNet.”

  Mark let out a low whooping sound. “All right. Now uplink the message and then let’s power down.”

  “There’s really no rush,” said Heather. “We absolutely cannot be traced. To them it will look like the signal just appeared inside their own network, and if they trace it back to its origin, they will find out it originated on a fiber inside their own building.”

  “Christ, this is great.”

  Heather frowned. “Still, I guess it would be wise not to spend too long surfing their network, at least for the moment. It might be a little hard to explain what we’re up to if your parents come back home unexpectedly.”

  “Are you kidding? I’ve got that story down. Our little science project here is cutting their electric bill.”

  Jennifer shook her head. “Better safe than sorry, though. I’m ready to send.”

  Heather leaned in closer. “Go for it.”

  Originally, they had put together a wordy message to the NSA. But after lengthy discussions, they had agreed less was more. With that in mind, they had settled on a very short message, encrypted with the same breakable encryption code as the earlier message their virus had delivered. That should get someone's attention.

  “Well, here goes nothing.”

  Amidst the cascading display of colors from the LED panel and the whistling rush of their steam-powered generator, Jennifer’s slender fingers flew across the keys like a concert pianist performing the works of Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninov. As Heather watched her friend at work, gooseflesh rose along her arms. Those dancing fingers were about to unleash a firestorm the like of which the NSA had never seen.

  71

  David Kurtz burst into Jonathan Riles’ office in such a hurry that the door banged against the doorstop, rippling the surface of Riles’ coffee.

  Riles looked up from his papers. “Yes, David? What has your panties in a bunch?”

  Although the hair on Kurtz’s head gave Albert Einstein a run for his money on a normal day, this afternoon it looked like he’d stuck a fork into a 220-volt socket. He tossed a stack of printouts on top of the other papers on Riles’ desk.

  “We have a situation that requires your immediate involvement.”

  Riles did not bother to glance at the readouts, focusing his steely gaze on Kurtz. “You have my full attention.”

  David Kurtz paused, something the most brilliant computer scientist on the planet almost never did. “Since the speculation is so outlandish, I’ll stick solely to the facts. We have received another message from the author of the New Year’s Day Virus, and this one came in on the SIPRNet.”

  “Have you traced the source?”

  “We have.”

  “And?”

  “It originated right here in the building, on a subnet on the third floor.”

  “What?”

  “I’ve run a complete trace, including a full message log and router dump. There can be no doubt.”

  “Shit. Have you isolated the subnet?”

  “I have taken that subnet and the thirteen connecting subnets off-line, physically disconnecting them from all other systems while we work this.”

  “Step it out another level.”

  “Sir, that will take a quarter of the systems in the building off-line.”

  “I don’t care. Do it.”

  Kurtz pressed a button on his secure cell phone, spoke a couple of words into the mouthpiece, and then flipped it closed. “It is done.”

  Riles rose from his chair, pacing to the digital display that took the place of the window that would have existed in a non-classified facility. He touched the screen, and the scene changed to a pristine beach in Maui.

  “Now, David, tell me about this message.”

  “Yes, sir. Since the encryption pattern exactly matched the New Year’s Day Virus, our IP sniffer picked it up instantly. It decrypted to five words: Rho Project Nanite Suspension Fluid.”

  “On the SIPRNet in our building?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “There’s no way to do it from outside. The SIPRNet systems do not have a physical connection to any non-SIPRNet line. Also, this message did not propagate to any other systems like the virus did. It just originated on one of our networks.”

  Riles turned away from Maui. “David, I want every single person with access to that part of the building restricted to site immediately. Place an emergency recall to anyone who is not currently in the building and get their asses in here ASAP. Get the interrogation team briefed and moving. Once we have everyone that could have possibly touched the system here and accounted for, nobody leaves until they are polygraphed. If the message didn’t come from outside the building, then I want to know which one of our people is responsible.”

  Kurtz turned toward the door.

  “David.”

  Kurtz stopped to look back at Riles.

  “That means everyone who could have touched any part of those subnets.”

  “I’ll be the first to take the poly,” David Kurtz responded, then turned and walked out the door.

  The door closed behind David Kurtz with a soft snick as the latch engaged. Jonathan Riles stared at the dark wood of the closed portal. He had just ordered over a hundred people to undergo an emergency polygraph that he did not think for a second would turn up anything. Still, if Jonathan Riles was anything, he was thorough. So he would do his duty. Tomorrow would be soon enough to delve into the other disturbing possibilities that whispered at the edge of his mind.

  Walking back to his desk, he glanced down at the words on the topmost of Kurtz’s stack of papers.

  Rho Project Nanite Suspension Fluid.

  The words did nothing to ease his state of mind.

  72

  The noise in the Pit was deafening. It seemed that half the state had turned out to see the basketball state championship game between the Los Alamos Hilltoppers and the Roswell Goddard Rockets. Even people who normally did not follow high school basketball had become enthralled with the story of the junior phenom, Marcus Aurelius Smythe.

  Indeed, his entrance into the University of New Mexico basketball stadium generated a welcome that a victorious Caesar would have found thrilling. Heather was stunned by the crowd response, which rose to such volume that she began to wonder if her ears would start bleeding.

  Sitting here in courtside seats with her mom, dad, and the Smythes, the thrill that surged through her enhanced nerve endings was tinged with just a hint of dismay. That Jack and Janet Johnson stood cheering immediately behind her only heightened her concern.

  Janet put two fingers between her lips and sent out a whistle that caused Mark to turn his head toward them and smile. If Heather’s ears had not been bleeding before, they certainly were now.

  Although the crowd’s size was surprising, both Heather and Jennifer had been expecting a response after Friday’s article in the sports section of the Albuquerque Journal.

  “Junior Point Guard Sets the Court on Fire” the sports headline had blared. Immediately below the headline, the picture showed Mark spinning between defenders, the ball passing between his legs in mid-dribble. Jennifer had almost succeeded in making her brother feel guilty about the attention he was drawing when Janet had walked by in the school hallway.

  “Mark, congratulations on the wonderful article. Jack and I are so excited for you.”

  With those few words, the brief hint of guilt disappeared from Mark’s face, vaporized as thoroughly as rainwater on a volcano.

  And so, here and now, they all stood together cheering in unison with thousands of others to whom Mark was a total stranger. Surreal.

  Jennifer’s sharp elbow interrupted Heather’s reverie. Her eyes moved across the stadium to the spot at which Jennifer pointed.

  “I didn’t know George Delome was friends with Raul,” Jennifer said.

  At the far end of the floor, near the entry hallway from the locker rooms, Raul stood in close conversation with
the Hilltoppers’ team manager.

  “George is a member of Raul’s Bible study group.”

  Just then the horn blared out, sending George scurrying across the floor toward the bench. Although Heather could not hear what was said, it was quite clear that Coach Harmon was less than pleased with George’s delay in getting the water bottles distributed.

  While he may have been tardy to this point, the alacrity with which the pudgy boy scurried along the bench setting out the individual bottles behind the player positions was impressive. He paused momentarily behind Mark’s spot, fumbling through the bag to grab a bottle, but then he was on down the rest of the line in manager record time.

  “What a geek,” Jennifer said, shaking her head as she watched him trip over some equipment at the far end.

  Heather nodded. What Raul saw in the fat kid was beyond her. Maybe he just took pity on him.

  The crowd cheered, signaling the tip-off and that the game was underway. Both teams opened up red hot, but the Rockets had no answer for Mark. They quickly abandoned their man-to-man defense, switching to a box-one zone. That let them keep a player man-to-man on Mark while everyone else played zone defense.

  Nevertheless, by the end of the first quarter, Mark had already scored fifteen points and had four assists. Hilltoppers, twenty-six. Rockets, twenty.

  The Hilltoppers continued building on their lead in the second quarter as Mark worked his magic, his spinning drives bringing the crowd to their feet.

  Then he began to falter. Three times in a row, as he brought the ball down the court against the Rocket full-court press, Mark lost the ball to quick double teams. Even his shot deteriorated. Just before halftime, he shot an air-ball fifteen feet from the basket. As the buzzer sounded, he walked off the court shaking his head in disbelief.