by Robin Cook
“I’m afraid I’m not going to stay awake,” Deborah said. “Do you realize it’s three o’clock in the morning back in Italy where our bodies think they are?”
“Why don’t you turn in?” Joanna suggested. “I’ll wait up.”
“Aren’t you tired?”
“I’m exhausted,” Joanna admitted.
Deborah put her feet over onto the floor, pushed herself up to a sitting position, but before she could stand, a raucous buzz filled the room. Both women started. It had been the first time they’d heard the front doorbell, and it was considerably louder than they expected.
“No fear we’ll ever miss that,” Deborah said, collapsing back onto the couch.
Joanna got to her feet and moved quickly over to the door panel. “What do I do?” she asked in a minor panic. There were several buttons as well as a circular area of perforations through the metal.
“You’re on your own.”
Joanna pressed the first button. A crackling sound issued forth. “Hello, hello!” she said with her mouth close to the perforations.
“It’s me, David!” a distant voice responded.
“Okay,” Joanna answered back. She then pressed the second button while still holding the first depressed. She heard a distant buzz, followed by the faint sound of the front door opening and then closing.
“Well, that wasn’t so difficult,” Joanna said. She walked over to the apartment door, opened it, and stepped out. Bending over the railing, she looked down. The hall was like a chambered nautilus with the stair spiraling all the way down to the street level.
David bounded up the stairs with a broad smile baked on his face. He was a tall, athletic African American. After a moment’s hesitation, he gave her a big hug. “How you doing, girl?” he said.
“Just fine,” Joanna answered, hugging back. Even though she’d not seen him for over two years, he appeared exactly the same; he had the same short, scruffy beard, the same laid-back manner, and the same casual clothes.
“Man, what a surprise to hear from you. You look good, real good!”
“You too,” Joanna said. “You haven’t changed one iota.”
“Just a little older and a little wiser,” David said with a laugh. “And I’m happy to report the old jump shot’s still going down fine. But you look different. In fact you look younger. How can that be?”
“You’re just trying to flatter me,” Joanna said.
“No, really!” David persisted. He moved from side to side to view Joanna from slightly different angles.
“Come on!” Joanna protested. “You’re embarrassing me.”
“No need to be embarrassed,” David said. “You look terrific. And now I know what it is. Your hair; it’s short. I’m not sure I would have recognized you if I had bumped into you on the street. You look like you’re sixteen.”
“Oh, sure!” Joanna said. “Come in and meet my roommate.”
Joanna took David’s arm. She led him inside and introduced him to Deborah, who’d managed to get herself upright. Joanna then apologized for not having a thing to offer him to drink.
“No problem,” David said. “We’ll make up for it on another occasion. Now I know you ladies must be tired just getting back from Italy and all, so why don’t we get right down to business.” He peeled off his jacket made of black parachute fabric. From his pocket he produced a handful of floppy discs and held them up. “I brought along some tools, including my brute force password-guessing program. Where’s your machine?”
A few minutes later David had the computer booted up and onto the Wingate Clinic’s web page. With a rapidity that made Deborah blink, David browsed around the site. His fingers moved like a concert pianist across the keyboard. “So far so good,” he reported.
“Can you tell me what you are doing?” Deborah asked.
“Nothing yet,” David said as he continued his surfing. “Just checking things out and looking for obvious holes in their firewall.”
“Do you see any?”
“Not yet, but they’re there.”
“How can you be sure.”
“One of the roles of a website is to provide the world with access to the organization’s network. Here you can see the Wingate Clinic has it set up for people to send in health-related data and to get information back. Any time there is such an exchange there’s the possibility of unauthorized access. In fact, in general, the more interactive a site is, the easier it is to hack. In other words, the more traffic, the more holes.”
Deborah nodded but she wasn’t sure she understood. Her use of computers was restricted to her biological research work, using the Internet as a resource, and sending E-mail.
“But what about passwords?” Deborah questioned. Whenever she used the computer in the lab, she had to enter her password, which only she knew. “Don’t those keep people out?”
“Yes and no,” David said. “That’s supposed to be the idea, but it doesn’t always work like it should. A lot of network managers are lazy and they never change the manufacturer default passwords, so that narrows down what has to be tried. Also with a www. server there’s no limit to how many attempts you can make, so we can try a brute-force password-guessing program like the one I brought with me.”
Deborah rolled her eyes for Joanna’s benefit.
“It’s actually a lot of fun,” David said, sensing Deborah’s doubt. “It’s like an intellectual arcade game.”
“I can’t imagine it’s too much fun for the people being hacked,” Joanna said.
“It’s usually pretty innocuous,” David said. “Most hackers I know aren’t malicious. It’s like an ongoing competition between them and the people designing the security. Or they’re just doing someone a favor like me with you guys. You’re not interested in doing anything other than getting the information that it seems to me you’re entitled to.”
“It would have been a lot easier if the clinic saw it that way,” Joanna said.
All at once David stopped typing. He stroked his beard thoughtfully. “Well, I have to give credit where credit is due. Seems like a pretty tight site. Certainly no glaring holes. In fact it seems to me to be fairly sophisticated. They’ve got an authentication server. Does this organization have a lot of bucks to throw around?”
“That would be my guess,” Joanna said.
“I’m getting the feeling we’re up against some pretty good security here,” David said, “which means we’ll have to get more sophisticated ourselves.”
“What is it exactly that you would like to be able to do?” Deborah asked.
“I’d like the web server to recognize and authenticate us,” David said. “Then we’d have the run of all their files. What I’m going to try now is to fill up the buffer on their new patient form and see if I can throw in some assembly-level commands in the space after the buffer to bypass the authentication. It’s like riding in through the CGI on the patient-form coattails.”
“Could you tell me that in English?” Deborah said.
David looked up to Deborah’s face. She was watching over his left shoulder. “I was actually simplifying the process when I just described it.”
“Fine!” Deborah said, pretending to be irritated. “If that’s the case, then I’ll take myself over to the couch and lie down. I’ll let you two computer wizards attend to business.”
David looked up at Joanna over his other shoulder. “I want to make sure you understand that if I do this, and it works, there will be an electronic trail through your Internet service provider to this machine. If the hack is picked up, they could come after you. Are you okay with that?”
Joanna mulled the question for a moment. She knew what they were doing was technically breaking the law, yet the information was important to her, even necessary for her peace of mind in view of the changes in her life. And what were the chances such an intrusion would be noticed if all they did was trace their own eggs? She thought the chances seemed small indeed.
“What do you think, Debora
h?” Joanna asked.
“I’m willing to leave it up to you,” Deborah said. “I’m curious, obviously, but not as curious as you.”
“Then let’s do it,” Joanna said.
“Right on, baby!” David said gleefully as he rubbed his hands together in anticipation of the challenge. He cracked a few of his knuckles before bending to the task. Again his fingers flew over the keyboard. The sound was like a continuous clatter rather than individual strokes. Images flashed on the screen in rapid succession.
After more than thirty minutes of intense concentration, David halted. He took an exasperated deep breath while flexing his fingers in the air.
“It’s not working, is it?” Joanna said.
“I’m afraid not,” David said. “This is no Mickey Mouse setup, that I can assure you.”
“What do you propose?”
David looked down at his watch. “This might be a long process. It’s a more secure site than I would have imagined, and it’s not letting me sneak in any commands whatsoever. I thought we were dealing with a Windows NT environment but it now looks like a Windows 2000 with Kerberos.”
“Is Kerberos the authentication method developed at M.I.T.?” Joanna asked.
“You got it,” David said.
“So what’s your bottom line suggestion as the easiest way to get the information we want?”
David laughed. “Let me stay here for a week, and I’ll try to bust in with stuff like the LophtCrack utility. Other than that, I’d suggest you find someone who works out there at the Wingate Clinic, who has access, and who would be sympathetic to your cause.”
“Those are the only two choices?”
“No, there’s something else. Get yourself or me into the server room.” David laughed again. “Actually, that’s the most efficient, foolproof way. Hell, it would probably only take less than ten minutes to create your own pathway. Then it would be a piece of cake, either from a workstation inside the network or even from offsite if you did it right.”
Joanna nodded while her mind pondered the choices. She felt progressively committed, as if the more she hit up against barriers, the more she wanted to succeed, especially since she could picture a little girl somewhere nearby who looked like the photos she had of herself as an infant.
David glanced down at his watch, then back up at Joanna. “It’s after ten. You want me to keep going here or what? I’m cool with it if you do, but like I said, I can’t promise anything other than I’m sure I can crack this site eventually. I just don’t know how long it will take.”
“You’ve done enough,” Joanna said. “Thank you.” She stared off vacantly deep in thought.
David noticed the faraway look in her green, unblinking eyes. He waited for several beats, then stuck his hand up in her line of sight and waved it back and forth. “Are you with me, girl?”
Joanna shook her head as if waking from a trance and smiled. “Sorry,” she said. “I was just wondering about what you said concerning getting into the server room. How hard would that be once you were in the building?”
“It all depends,” David said. “Obviously if they care about security, it’s not like you can just walk in anytime you want.”
“But it is physically a room,” Joanna said. “It’s not just computer jargon about something that exists in cyberspace.”
“It’s a real room all right,” David said. “And it’s got real hardware inside, which includes a keyboard and a monitor to access the central processor.”
“How would you envision the room to be secured?”
“A locked door,” David said. “All the ones I’ve seen have had a card swipe access. You know: like a credit card.”
“Interesting,” Joanna said. “If I were to get in there, what exactly would I do?”
“That’s the easy part,” David said. “You have some paper handy?”
Joanna pulled open one of the desk drawers and got out a fresh yellow legal pad. She handed it to David who proceeded to outline the steps that needed to be done. Joanna watched with full attention. At several points she asked for clarification, which David was happy to provide.
“And that’s it,” David said. He ripped off the page and handed it up to Joanna. She glanced over it again. Satisfied she had no further questions, she folded it and slipped it into her pocket.
“Thank you ever so much for coming over,” Joanna said.
“Hey, my pleasure,” David said. He scraped back the chair and stood up. “Any time for a former classmate.”
“By the way, how’s your Ph.D. thesis coming along?” Joanna asked.
“Now you’re starting to sound like my mother,” David said with a laugh. He gathered his floppy discs into a neat pile. “Unfortunately I’m running into a little writer’s block along about the second chapter. How’s yours?”
“Very well,” Joanna said. “It’s done.”
“Done!” David squeaked before blowing out a lungful of air through pursed lips. He visibly sagged. “What a way to cut a friend off at the knees.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Hey, it’s not your fault.”
“Maybe you should think about changing your environment,” Joanna suggested. “That’s what Deborah and I did. She’s finished as well.”
“Maybe it’s because I’m not so fired up about Stochastic Processes in the Commodity Markets of Third World Countries any longer. But then again, who would be? Anyway, if I’m not being too personal, how are you and your fiance getting along?”
“I’m no longer engaged,” Joanna said.
David’s posture improved. “Really? How long has that been?”
“A year and a half.”
“Are you okay with that?”
“It was my idea.”
“Cool. How about you and me having dinner some night?”
“I’d like that,” Joanna said.
“I’ll be in touch,” David said. He pulled on his jacket and pocketed his floppy discs. On his way to the door he glanced over at Deborah’s supine form. “Say good-bye to your roommate.”
“I’m not asleep,” Deborah said. She pushed herself up to a sitting position and blinked repeatedly in the light.
After another round of small talk David said his final goodbyes and departed. Deborah, who was still sitting on the couch, watched Joanna go over to the computer to shut it down.
“No luck getting into the Wingate’s files?” Deborah questioned. She yawned widely.
“Not yet,” Joanna said. The computer monitor went blank and the electronics unit fan went silent.
“Is David still going to try?”
“No, I am.” Joanna walked past Deborah and disappeared into the bathroom.
“I’m confused,” Deborah called out. “The reason you called David was because you couldn’t do it. Did he give you some suggestions or advice that makes you think you can do it now?”
“We’re moving to plan B,” Joanna called out over the sound of running water.
Deborah stood up from the couch. She waited for a moment to allow a wave of queasiness to pass. Giddy with fatigue she made her way over to the open bathroom door and leaned against the jamb. Joanna was brushing her teeth.
“I’m afraid to ask, but what in heaven’s name is plan B?”
“I’m going to get a short-term job at the Wingate Clinic,” Joanna said through foam.
“You have to be joking,” Deborah said.
Joanna spit loudly into the sink, then looked at Deborah in the mirror. “I’m serious. The only certain, expedient way of getting into the Wingate Computer files is to get into their server room, at least according to David.”
“This is crazy,” Deborah said. The sleepiness in her voice disappeared. “First of all, David doesn’t seem to be the source of infallible information. When he got here he was sure he could hack into the Wingate computer, but he couldn’t.”
“He’d be able to do it, it just might take a long time. He knows what he’s talking about. He gave me very
specific suggestions once I get into the Wingate server room.” Joanna went back to brushing her teeth.
Deborah made a gesture of exasperation with her hands then put them on her hips. She watched her roommate for several minutes before responding. “Won’t this server room be locked?”
“Probably,” Joanna said. She rinsed her mouth and plopped her toothbrush into the water glass business side up. “I’ll just have to be resourceful. David thinks it will have a card swipe access. I’ll just have to get one of those cards.” Joanna started washing her face.
“Do you realize how insane this sounds?” Deborah said.
“I don’t think it sounds insane in the slightest,” Joanna said. “I want to know if there are children from my eggs, and I thought you wanted to know about yours as well.”
“Of course I want to know, but that’s not the point.”
“I think it is the point.”
“Let’s be practical about this,” Deborah said, trying to control her voice. “How are you going to get a job at the Wingate Clinic?”
“It should be easy,” Joanna said. “Remember when we were out there they said they were always looking for people. They said that finding help was the downside of being in such a rural area. Well, I’m good at word processing. I’m sure I can find something to do.”
“But they’ll recognize you,” Deborah said with a vehemence that bordered on anger.
“Calm down!” Joanna urged. She stared at her roommate who’d become red in the face.
“Don’t you understand: They’ll recognize you,” Deborah repeated. “Probably most of the people we dealt with out there are still there, from the receptionist to the doctors.”
“I don’t think people would recognize me,” Joanna said. “We were only out there for one morning a year and a half ago. Tonight David said he wouldn’t have recognized me with my short hair if he bumped into me on the street, and he saw me at least three times a week for a number of years. And I won’t use my real name.”
“You’re not going to be able to get a job without giving a Social Security number,” Deborah said. “And the number and the name have to match. It’s not going to work.”
