Buzzworm (A Technology Thriller): Computer virus or serial killer?

by Theo Cage

  BW wanted to strangle the scrawny detective from Vice with his own hands. They hadn’t paid him a small fortune over the years to shoot outside of the lines. The one disadvantage of managing people at a distance was not being able to smack them around. Xavier would be the one to get the satisfaction. Xavier would get to use his open hand on Wishnowsky. BW would pay anything to deliver the blow himself.

  BW imagined taking the cop out. Using the detective’s own gun on him. That would be satisfying for a few minutes. But Wish was the key link to the network of cops at the Washington police department who were on the take. They trusted the doddering old fool. And who knew what angry cops might do if they heard that one of their own had been killed? That could tear the whole city apart. Stranger things had happened. Look at the race riots in LA.

  BW felt a shiver ripple through his guts. His anger for Strange had just escalated. But there was more. BW sensed the slippery programmer was getting closer to finding out his secrets. And now he had found a way around Washington Vice and was hanging with Homicide. Hyde and Strange needed to be taken out and soon. Time was running out.

  BW had nearly choked on his caffeine cocktail days before — when he had seen Med sitting in the cafeteria with the Canadian contractor. That was a combination he never expected. Med was on the GIPETTO project. GIPETTO was as classified as you can get. There was no reason they should be talking. But he heard that Jo had given their partnership her stamp of approval. That stupid woman. She had no idea how dangerous GIPETTO was. And BW couldn’t understand how they could trust Strange? Everyone knew he had broken into banks for pocket change. GIPETTO’s secrets were worth millions. Maybe billions.

  BW’s plan to have Med shaken up a bit was also foiled. Med wasn’t as helpless as he thought, and Xavier had shown up at the last minute to scare the mugger away. This gave BW a splitting headache thinking that his NOC agent was acting at cross-purposes with him. He also hated the thought of Duke and Strange putting their heads together or anything else for that matter. How had they connected? Was she sharing her troubles with GIPETTO? Was that possible? The two of them together was a nightmare come true for him. She knew the CIA culture and people and he was obviously experienced in security penetration. The CIA doesn’t pay that kind of money for amateurs.

  BW rubbed his head. There were too many options. Too many potential points of trouble. His head felt like it had been hit by a sledge hammer. He needed to know what Wishnowsky had to say about this failure to follow through on a simple directive.

  BW jerked in his chair. On his screen he could now see Vienna and Med joining Strange and the pig-headed homicide dick. They were headed for the elevators. He tracked them as they dropped three floors, not saying much to each other. They left the elevator on sub three and headed for Scammel’s lab. He grunted and slammed his hand down on his desk. Once they entered the lab he would lose contact. There were no security cameras in the secure work areas. What were they up to?

  BW banged his fist again on his desktop. He was blind. The head of GIPETTO was in a closed room with the Washington police and he had no idea what they were talking about. He tried the network, but of course none of Frank’s computers were online. They had been removed, so he couldn’t check to see if they were looking for clues on the workstations. He wanted to smash his keyboard with both hands, imagining the keys, like broken bones, spraying across the room.

  As a last resort, his hands shaking, BW checked the whiteboard system in the lab, the only other computer in the room. It was active. He mapped the screen of the whiteboard display to his monitor and he felt his throat constrict. They were looking at the GIPETTO presentation that Frank showed him only an hour before he died — before BW had instructed him on how to kill himself, while he watched. But this was only a demonstration of the shader routines; why would it matter to them? BW had never thought to erase the file, but now, looking at it from Hyde’s point of view, it felt dangerous and revealing.

  Then the screen changed. They were opening the security camera files taken the night of the suicide. Someone was scanning through the video taken early in the morning. Then the images froze. The screen showed the empty hallway at 1:38 AM. But the hallway wasn’t empty. There was a gray shadow on the carpet and the wall where a shadow shouldn’t exist. They were zooming in on the muddy gray pattern. BW felt like the air had suddenly gone out of the room. The shadow was his. Or what was left of it after Scammel’s defective program attempted to erase his presence from the security tapes. He sat back in his chair, unable to take his eyes off the screen. It was only a partial shadow. But how many other partial shadows existed in the system? Had Scammel done this on purpose? Was there a computer process they could use to restore the original image?

  BW moved up closer to his computer screen, his hands now moving over the same keys that only seconds ago he imagined shattering into plastic fragments. He laughed to himself. They thought they were clever. What was a shadow? Compared to the nightmare he was about to put them all through. He realized then their next obvious step. Once Hyde realized that someone had visited Scammel early in the morning, he would go to the security team and ask to see who had entered the building that day. That would be a long list; there were hundreds of employees at Building 213. But what if they weren’t looking for employees. What if Hyde figured out that the mysterious shadow person was a visitor? That would narrow the search. So BW ran the report. He wasn’t surprised to see only four names came up. Two analysts from the Department of Defense, a reporter from The Economist. And him. All complete with photographs taken from security badges.

  BW shivered slightly. To Hyde, the photo ID would be meaningless. But Med would recognize him. That would end the game very quickly. He keyed into Building 213’s security log application, activated his access, and erased his file and the picture. He logged out and dropped his head. That had been close. Too close. But he couldn’t deny that the adrenaline had been flowing, and he felt like he had just won an important battle. He would live to see another day. That was more than he could say for the four people in Scammel’s video lab.

  CHAPTER 30

  Med stared into the dark of her small apartment, a cold weight on her chest.

  What had her sister said? Find some guy who doesn’t think he’s James Bond. It was partly said in fun, but it had hurt nonetheless. In fact, the pain was so sharp and sudden that it had brought tears to her eyes.

  At the same time, she marveled at the insight. She loved her sister dearly, but sometimes she came a little too close to the mark for comfort.

  Now Med crossed her arms over her chest wishing the dread would go away. Who was Xavier anyway? Roger had been instantly suspicious of him. He was probably jealous. A rich guy who traveled the world. What was not to be envious about? If you thought about it, took all the happy smiles and warm glances into account and, ok, the lingering touching and the passion — then wiped them right out of the equation, you were left with one unalterable question. Why was David interested in her? He had homes in three cities. A company that made millions. He could have his choice of women.

  She tried to slow her breathing.

  Her suspicions had nagged her right from the beginning, but she had ignored them. This whole love affair, even the idea of being in love period, felt so good and she didn't want to jinx it. But doesn't everyone ask themselves that question... why me? What did David see in little Mary Ellen Duke, the skinny tomboy from Minnesota? He was one of those people born directly into opportunity and control, tall, convincing, assured. Yes, dammit, assured. One of those guys never at a loss for words. He always knew what to say, what to wear, where to look, what to think. And did he have to be so freaking charming?

  She got up and paced around the clutter of files and magazines on the floor. Look at this place? Was this the nest of a future Mrs. Anyone? She kicked one pile and sent it tumbling under the coffee table. They had their moments together. But then, so did Beauty and the Beast. She cringed at the analogy. She imagined him
grimacing at her, out of her sight, and this sent a shaft of pain through her center that momentarily made her dizzy. Shit. She had been in love, but it was beginning to feel like a disease – a huge insurmountable sticky kind of a love that was blurring her vision. With a man who might have chosen her to be some kind of dupe, although she couldn't imagine to what purpose. She hadn't given up any state secrets in a moment of passion, that she was clear on. She couldn't remember him even once mentioning her work. But she still had a sense that she had fallen for a manipulator; a cool opportunist with charcoal gray eyes and perfect teeth. Someone her mother would have loved. She thrashed at another pile of files and got some tiny bit of satisfaction seeing the cover of an issue of Wired separate itself from the body of the magazine.

  After talking to her sister, Laura, her eyes stinging with anger and hurt, she had taken the fancy key ring hard drive David had given to her and had thrown it against the kitchen wall. Why had she done that? She had solidly defended him to Laura. Very few people understood the life of a successful business person or for that matter, people like herself who slaved away in the bowels of the CIA. But her sister laughed it off. This wasn't about intelligence, she had said. This was about fucking. That word had upset her more than anything else because what they did wasn't just screwing. It was more than that. Wasn't it?

  The clear plastic cover of the tiny key ring hard drive shattered and lay on the kitchen counter and she stared at it as if it were parts of David lying there. Attractive, shiny and hard.

  Her sister had been right. There was something cold about him; despite the perfect set of his mouth when he smiled at you, the way his eyes seemed to be seeing only her... she choked slightly. She was mourning his loss already, she thought, numbed by the idea.

  David clearly acted like he cared about her. He was thoughtful to a fault. He was just never around. That was the problem. She was a bright, attractive partner for him, and he had shown that he enjoyed the company of intelligent and imaginative people. And she couldn't help but think that romantically, what they had, was special. Maybe even for him, there was some surprise in his attraction to this number crunching, obsessive female.

  Making love to David — no, that wasn't quite right. David making love to her — was the highlight of their time together. It was so unlike anything she had ever experienced with anyone else. He was so totally dedicated to her needs. So totally unselfish in the act of love. She couldn't help but smile then, standing in the tiny kitchen, feeling a chill run through her body. Was any man that perfect?

  She leaned on the counter and set about cleaning up the pieces of the drive, hoping it would take her mind off her confusion, when she froze. In her hand she held the tiny memory drive attached to a key chain ring minus its plastic cover. This was not a cheap Radio Shack consumer product. Etched on the blue-green circuit board in tiny gold letters, she read 500 GB. Five hundred gigabytes? That was more memory than most people had on their desktops. And it felt expensive — that was the only way she could categorize it. Even the CIA, which was quite proud of its technology, had nothing bigger than a 64 Gigabyte USB drive. Here was David, Mr. What Do I Know About Computers handing off some high-end advanced techno-bauble to his girlfriend.

  Then she noticed something else. There was no brand name; this from a guy who lived the brand image from his Ferrari sports car to his hand-tailored Australian merino wool Raymond Unlimited suits. If this were some high-priced premium product made for guys like David, who needed to believe they had to own the world’s best, then wouldn't it be branded that way? Wouldn't it say "You hold in your hands the world’s finest and most expensive product in its class and the person who paid for them obviously has money to burn and an ego to match?” But it didn't say that. It said nothing. A no-brand.

  She wandered back into the living room and inserted the connector of the tiny drive into one of the USB ports on the front of her laptop. She stared at the screen for a few seconds trying to understand why this portable storage device would be any different from the garden-variety type. They might be better made, she thought — less likely to be damaged, military-quality — although she couldn't imagine why the CIA wouldn't use the same type, if they were as superior as they looked. She slid her finger over the mouse pad below the keyboard and read out the contents of the drive. She had never transferred her own files to the drive, not having the time or having security concerns about transferring work documents.

  MicroFlight.doc 9,002,340

  There was one file on the disk. It was over nine gigabytes in size. That was enough to store an entire 3D movie. She double-clicked on the file and watched as it loaded. She noticed something then that puzzled her. There were three small lights on the front panel of her IBM laptop. A green light indicated that the CD disk was operating, an orange light indicated Intranet activity, and a red LED flashed when the hard drive was busy. Not only had the red light begun to flash, but so did the high-speed Internet indicator. She had never noticed before the hard drive on her laptop starting-up during the loading of a document file from a USB device. Why would it do that? She tried it once more. Again, the red light flashed on and off. She then took one of her USB drives, a much smaller one she used to take work home on, and loaded a file from it. Only the green light glowed as the file was processed.

  Med inserted David's drive again and for the third time loaded the file. She skimmed through the contents. It was clearly a copy of the MicroFlight website, the one that David’s company used to promote its products. But something didn't make sense. Document files were normally pretty small, about a hundredth of the size of this file, and usually even less. There were quite a few pictures, but that still didn’t account for the size. She felt a headache coming on. That meant, in computer terms, an awful lot of something was hidden in the files that David had loaded on the flash drive. The document was like an iceberg; ninety-five percent hidden from view, but massive just the same. When she plugged this into her computer at work, what had happened? What had she done?

  Med felt her skin flush. She had been looking everywhere throughout the GIPPETO computer system, for the source of that terrible video. She had access to one of the most powerful computers ever built, and now it looked like she was the one who had done the impossible. She had infected an Avion supercomputer — with a simple memory device she had been routinely taking into work — a present from her boyfriend.

  CHAPTER 31

  Roger Strange noticed for the first time, as he was being escorted out of Building 213 by security for the second time, that he could see the Lincoln Memorial off in the distance to the north, through a slight haze of mist.

  He stood there, on the edge of the parking lot, considering his options.

  Vienna had fired him that morning. She said she was sorry, but the Division no longer required his services.

  Within a few minutes the same two uniforms that had presented him to Wishnowsky, were marching him out onto the street. They seemed filled with satisfaction over their simple task; he felt defeated and worthless. And naked without his laptop, which the police still had in custody.

  Lacking any real destination for the moment, he decided a long walk would clear his head, so he headed up along the river walk that followed the Potomac River. He knew the Lincoln and Washington Memorials, as well as the Reflecting Pool, were close by — famous landmarks he’d seen in movies. And since he only had one or two days left in D.C., he didn’t want to miss them.

  Vienna had been apologetic to him, but she said she had no choice in the matter. Her division was under siege, and all non-essential personnel had been asked to leave. Strange had no idea how this affected the terms of his contract or the deal he had made to find the virus. He wasn’t in the mood right now to call his boss and tell her that her gravy train had just derailed.

  Roger continued walking south. The clouds hung low over the nations capital and the sky was threatening rain, which only added to his sense of being alone and helpless. He needed to forget about
his argument with Med and the fact that he would probably never see her again. He also had the complete failure of his primary mission to contend with – which meant a quick return to his jail cell and maybe worse.

  Over the past week, the Internet, the blogosphere and the media, were filled with reports of virus attacks on public and private sites. But Roger knew something most bloggers didn’t; the CIA was already bloodied and about to collapse. And no one seemed aware of it. If that was the case with other organizations in other countries. He couldn’t even imagine what this could lead to.

  Following the Rock Creek Park trail next to the river, he passed the John Ericsson Memorial and was quickly into parkland. He could see the Lincoln Memorial rising up like a Greek temple in the distance, and off to the east, the unmistakable spire of the Washington Memorial. He felt like he had crossed over into another world. He could feel the hairs on the back of his neck tingle. Could a small army of fanatics have an impact on all that this represented? Roger knew that 9/11 proved that it could. Only this time the terrorism came from within.

  He arrived at the traffic circle surrounding the Lincoln Memorial. Tourists who had come to the capital were pouring up and down the steps. Everyone seemed so oblivious to what was going on only a few blocks away.

  Roger checked his cell phone. He still had Hyde’s cell number in memory. What he knew about Xavier was giving him a headache, but he had been afraid to bring it up in detail. Roger knew that Hyde could easily pry the source out of him. That would only support everyone’s belief that he was a low life hacker skulking around the Internet and stealing data. Which he was.

  Roger pressed the re-dial. The detective answered immediately. He was understandably distant and gruff when he learned who had called.