No Apologies and No Regrets

by Roddy Wix

“This is such a beautiful town. I can’t believe how fortunate I am to have met Gabe.”

  Anne sat back and enjoyed the gentle California sun washing over the little café. She liked the Mediterranean cuisine and the place was only a few blocks from the office.

  “Did he say you met through a mutual friend?”

  “Yes. Dr. Roy Chun at MIT. He was my dissertation advisor and I stayed to do research work with him after graduation. I never left.”

  “We’ve not met, but he’s well known. I had friends at Stanford who studied with Dr. Chun.”

  Bart secretly wondered if those friends were the Rusikov brothers and for a second, thoughts of Ilya’s digital videos flashed through his mind. He shoved them aside and jumped into the conversation.

  “I might have studied with him, but as we all know, I dropped out.” He gave a smile as he went to work on a flatbread concoction.

  “Dropping out is becoming fashionable these days.” Anne said giving Bart a flirtatious smile. “Seems like everyone who’s made a lot of money dropped out of somewhere.”

  “Yeah. Then they turn around and hire an army of Ivy League MBA’s and JD’s to run their companies.” In truth, Bart remained a little sensitive about his lack of a degree. On the other hand, he just made ten million dollars. How many MBA’s were doing that in this market?

  “They need all the name brand B-School types for their IPO’s. They make for good window dressing.” Sally took a sip of Diet Coke and a bite of Bart’s flatbread. She was definitely marking her territory.

  “So, how long have you and Bart been together?”

  Bart checked the time and said, “About forty-eight hours.”

  Anne laughed but Sally jumped in with, “Truly, Anne, I adored Bart the first moment I saw him. That was two years ago.” She put a hand possessively on his shoulder. Bart could only shake his head wonderingly.

  “Well, obviously you enjoy one another. It’s great you can also work together. Dynamic Integrity seems like a wonderful place to be.”

  “An excellent place,” Bart said with enthusiasm.

  “Of course, I spent years in a concrete dungeon at MIT.” Anne waved her arms saying, “Palo Alto is paradise to me.” She was starting to get the hang of her new persona, but she reminded herself to not become too comfortable quite yet.

  “Silicon Valley is beautiful and never dull, that’s for sure. What were you working on at MIT, if I may ask?” Sally fixed her eyes on the newcomer.

  “I’ve spent a lot of time doing things similar to your work. I was looking for hackers and viruses that might be part of a terrorist plot then designing ways to defend against them. It was a joint grant program funded by MIT, private sector, and Homeland Security.”

  “Must have been an interesting environment. I wonder who those private companies were.” Bart was anxious to hear more, though he had no desire to be closer to the Federal Government than he already was.

  “Very interesting, and I’d love to tell you about it, but most of my work was Top Secret.” She gave him a demure smile.

  “Homeland Security. It seems like the privacy Nazis are everywhere these days.” Sally spoke in an indifferent tone though she surprised Bart with the first political statement he’d ever heard her make.

  “Sally and I have been working parallel tracks on this “Blitz” program, but you seem to have managed to get ahead of us.”

  “I wouldn’t say that. Gabe asked me to evaluate the program from my own perspective and with a goal of isolating and removing the virus. That’s when I figured out there were two sets of code.”

  “That was relatively easy compared to quarantining or removing the real code.” Sally gave Anne a cheerful smile, but Bart sensed her claws were at the ready.

  “I’m still wondering why they developed such an elaborate program just to mask the insertion of another source code.’” Bart himself was on guard to not reveal how much information he had.

  Anne was the first to speak. “I think it was to fool someone. Maybe these Rusikov brothers had a buyer for the thing. There’s a market. Large scale cyber terrorism is close to being a reality. It’s just a matter of time.”

  “So you think the Rusikovs were playing a dangerous game?”

  “Correct,” she responded. “Once I understood the structure it wasn’t terribly difficult to find the second string of code, but all I’ve been able to do so far is to cobble together a means of isolating it from incoming instructions. I’m worried that whoever wrote it built in a backdoor I haven't located yet.”

  “They most likely did. The brothers were smart and if they were conning someone at that level I’d have to say they were even slicker than I imagined.” Bart’s thoughts returned to the Ferrari and the feeling his time with the car was drawing short.

  “We were acquainted at Stanford,” Sally said and offered nothing more. She knew the NYSE system architecture better than anyone and still wondered over how Anne absorbed it so quickly.

  “Did you know them well?” Anne asked.

  “I suppose, but after graduation I only saw them on occasion.” Sally was matter of fact about it, but Bart wondered what “on occasion” meant.

  “I’m sorry your friends are dead, but I wonder whether or not they wrote all of the code themselves.”

  “Why would you say that?” Sally asked a little too quickly.

  “I’m not sure yet, but I think someone else may have been involved.”

  “Hmmm. Sounds like a first class mystery.” Bart sounded intrigued.

  “What makes you think that?” Sally asked in flatly.

  “Several years ago I worked with someone who connected with a hacker known only by a code name. My colleague said this person was the ‘best in the world’. I had a chance to look at some of their work and I’m inclined to agree.”

  “How does that connect with the Rusikovs?” Sally asked flatly though she was immediately suspicious of who she was really talking to.

  “Maybe it doesn't, though there are similarities. Its almost as if the Rusikovs wrote what I’m calling the ‘bogus’ code and this other person wrote the really dangerous one still embedded in the NYSE's system.”

  Sally sipped her glass of wine thoughtfully and said nothing. Clearly she and Anne were destined to be competitors.

  “So where is this person now?” Bart was finishing his lunch and already thinking about dessert.

  “I have no idea. He went dormant about the same time I saw the files, sometime around three years ago.”

  “Why do you think someone so talented would go dormant?” Sally asked without expression.

  “I should have said ‘appeared’ to. My colleague believed this person to be enormously powerful, a kind of cyber wizard who could manipulate systems almost at will. Someone like that could operate beyond detection for years.”

  “That’s as spooky as the Singularity. Maybe they’re right here with us.” Bart held up his cell phone and peered at it.

  “Or perhaps they’re just over there at the next table.” Anne laughed as she said it, but Sally gave only a thin smile.

  “Motive?”

  Anne smiled at her new friends. “We’re all hackers of a sort. Why do any of us do what we do? The thrill and the challenge top my list. What about you two?”

  “Yeah. That’s me. ‘The thrill of victory and the agony of defeat’ as they used to say.” Bart laughed, but having his first program stolen still pained him a little. He opened the dessert menu.

  “We’ve all had our ‘ups and downs’. What about you, Sally?”

  “Truthfully, I joined Dynamic Integrity because I just wanted a shot at fucking the bad guys.”

  Bart winced a little. This was the first time he’d heard her drop the “f” bomb outside her own house and then it was in a sexual situation. He was also surprised by Anne’s response.

  “I’m with you, Sally. Here’s to fucking the bad guys.”


  “And to having the wisdom to recognize who they are.”

  The two women clinked their wine glasses together. Bart put his menu down for a moment and wondered if this was the beginning of a long friendship or a massive rivalry. He decided to give the question due consideration right after the crème Brule.

  66.