Overkill pr-1

by James Barrington

  The message on the laptop screen changed again. ‘Authorization Code Three Accepted. For Final Verification, Enter Authorization Code Six’. Trushenko referred again to his diary and began carefully entering the letters and numbers.

  Hammersmith, London

  ‘What code has it asked for?’ Baker demanded.

  ‘Six,’ Richter said.

  Baker’s fingers were moving rapidly over the keyboard. ‘Got it,’ he said.

  Richter looked at the screen. The computer displayed the title ‘Authorization Code List – Page One’, and underneath it twenty horizontal lines of letters and numbers. Baker pressed the ‘Print’ button to save the original codes on paper, then swiftly moved the cursor down to Code Six. The last two digits were ‘ДШ’, so he altered them to ‘ГД’ and saved the change.

  Port-Khorly, Prichernomorskaya Nizmennost’ District, Ukraine

  Trushenko sat back, puzzled. The laptop was displaying a message from the Krutaya mainframe – ‘Authorization Code Six Not Accepted. Enter Authorization Code Ten’. He shook his head and referred again to his diary.

  Hammersmith, London

  ‘What code is that?’ Baker asked.

  The Cyrillic for ‘ten’ is ‘ДЕСЯТь’ – identical to ‘ДЕВЯТь’ – ‘nine’ – apart from one letter. Richter hadn’t slept in something like thirty hours, and he was beginning to feel the strain. His eyes were tired and, because of his position slightly to one side of Baker, his view of the screen was somewhat distorted. All these factors combined into a single, dreadful mistake. Instead of the ‘Ten’ that the screen was displaying, Richter read the number as ‘Nine’. ‘Code Nine,’ he said, and Baker obediently changed the last two digits on Code Nine.

  ‘We can do this all day’ Baker said cheerfully, and leaned back in his chair.

  Port-Khorly, Prichernomorskaya Nizmennost’ District, Ukraine

  Trushenko had just entered the twelfth – and correct – digit of Code Ten when the hotel room door burst open. Three men stood there with drawn pistols. ‘Minister Trushenko,’ Captain Kabanov said, ‘please step away from the computer.’

  Dmitri Trushenko stood up to face them, and smiled. ‘You are,’ he said, ‘too late. Much too late.’ He turned away from the table, but then span back and hit the ‘Enter’ key.

  Kabanov fired immediately. The first bullet hit Trushenko on his right arm, was deflected by the bone of his elbow, and shattered the screen of the laptop. The second shot entered Trushenko’s left eye, killing him instantly. As he fell, his arm caught the telephone cord and tore the plug out of the modem, breaking the connection a little under one hundredth of a second before the transmission of Code Ten was completed.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Thursday

  Hammersmith, London

  ‘He’s gone,’ Baker said.

  ‘Where?’ Richter asked.

  ‘No idea. The connection’s been dropped. Right, with friend Trushenko out of the way, let’s tidy this lot up.’ Baker accessed the Username Table, selected ‘Modin, General Nicolai’, and changed the ‘Pripiska’ password to ‘3tY&8$@Wq2#9’, which he then carefully wrote down, checking it twice. ‘They’ll take weeks to crack that,’ he said, ‘if they ever do.’ Baker checked Current Log Ins again, and found that the two other users had logged off the system. ‘That’s handy,’ he said. ‘It saves us having to wait until they’ve finished their day’s work. They can’t get back in because of the changes I’ve made. So, let’s see what we can do.’

  He selected the Network Control module and looked at the screen. ‘Here we are,’ he said. ‘A schematic diagram of the whole network. The satellite uplink is at Pechora, and the network has only two permanent connections, to Yazenevo and a Moscow number.’

  ‘Can you do anything about the permanent connection?’

  ‘I already have done,’ Baker said. ‘The connections are only permanent in that the telephone lines link the Krutaya computer directly with those locations, rather than having to route through any exchanges. Anybody wanting to use the computer would still have to input a valid username and password and log in just as we did. As I’ve changed the passwords of all the listed users,’ he added, ‘they can’t get into the system at all.’

  Baker turned his attention to the Weapon Control module. He accessed the menu, and Richter translated the sub-menu choices for him. ‘OK,’ Baker said. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘Disarm them all, starting with Europe, except that one,’ Richter pointed at the screen.

  ‘The London weapon. OK, if that’s what you want.’ Baker concentrated on the screen while he navigated through the available options. He chose the Paris weapon, then looked at the options. ‘Here we are. What do these mean?’

  ‘This is Disable Sequence and that’s Abort Sequence.’

  Baker selected the Disable Sequence, pressed the ‘Enter’ key and looked at the screen. ‘Another message. Can you translate it, please?’

  Richter leaned over his shoulder. ‘It says “Paris Device. Activation of the Disable Sequence will temporarily disarm this weapon. Are you sure you want to proceed?” That’s not what we want,’ Richter said. ‘Try the Abort Sequence.’

  Baker selected the other option, and they looked at the screen. ‘OK,’ Richter said. ‘The message reads ‘Paris Device. Activation of the Abort Sequence will permanently disarm this weapon. Are you sure you want to proceed?’ I’d say yes, if I were you. In Cyrillic script that’s “DA” – “ДА”,’ Richter added, ‘so it’s “D”, not “Y”.’

  Baker nodded, pressed the ‘D’ key and then the ‘Enter’ key. The screen cleared, and another message appeared.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ Richter muttered.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s saying “Operation failed. You require Administrator or System Designer access to modify the status of any weapon”.’

  The Walnut Room, the Kremlin, Krasnaya ploshchad, Moscow

  ‘It’s over, Comrade President,’ Yuri Baratov said, smiling. ‘Trushenko was found in Port-Khorly near Odessa. We believe he was in the act of attempting to detonate a weapon. The SVR officer in charge opened fire, and the Minister did not survive the encounter.’

  The Russian President smiled. ‘Probably the best way, really. It saves any trial or embarrassment for us.’ He nodded. ‘Thank you, Yuri. Now I really do have something to tell the Americans.’

  Hammersmith, London

  ‘So now what?’ Baker asked, sitting back in his chair.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Richter replied. ‘You’re the computer expert, not me. First, and most important, can anyone else get into the system and detonate the weapons?’

  Baker shook his head decisively. ‘No way,’ he said. ‘I’ve changed all the passwords.’

  ‘OK. So the only person in the system, or who can get into the system, is you?’

  ‘I just said that.’

  ‘I know,’ Richter said. ‘I just wanted to be sure because this is too important to cock up. OK, the system’s secure so there’s no immediate need to worry. If you can’t get in and disable the weapons through the satellite, that can always be done on site – General Modin told me that the weapons can be deactivated locally. What we need is the precise location of each weapon, so we can advise the Americans and everyone else. Can you do that using Modin’s access to the system?’

  ‘Probably,’ Baker replied, looking at the menu choices. ‘Yes, here we are, I think.’

  ‘“Weapon Locations (Europe)”,’ Richter read. ‘Yes, print that, please.’ A thought struck him, ‘Can you also save the information on disk?’

  Baker nodded, stuck a floppy disk into the drive and pressed a sequence of keys. The drive light illuminated and went out a few seconds later. Baker extracted the disk, wrote ‘Weapons – Europe’ on it and handed it to Richter.

  The laser printer generated forty-five sheets, three for each weapon. Richter picked one up and scanned it. It was highly detailed and quite unambiguous, giving the prec
ise location of the strategic-yield neutron bomb positioned at Toulouse, together with information about the power supply back-up routines, the location of the satellite dish and receiver system, and even the serial numbers of some of the pieces of equipment. If anyone needed documentary evidence of Podstava, those pages provided it.

  Baker did the same for the American devices, first copying the information on to a floppy disk and then printing a hard copy. The process took longer because there were over six hundred sheets to print, and even at the six pages a minute that the printer was capable of, it took nearly two hours. Richter slumped, dozing, in his chair, a result of his lack of sleep and the somewhat soporific sound of the sheets of paper being fed through the laser.

  At half past seven Baker leaned back wearily in his seat, then reached over and shook Richter awake. ‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘Can I break the connection now?’

  ‘No,’ Richter replied. He stood up, stretching his aching limbs and picked up the disk Baker had marked ‘Weapons – America’ and the plastic tray containing the printed sheets. ‘I’m going up to see Simpson. Make another file copy of the weapon locations for our records so we can print the information whenever we need it. Keep trying to get into the module to disable the weapons. And when you get tired of trying to do that, there’s one other thing I’d like you to do.’

  Le Moulin au Pouchon , St Médard, near Manciet, Midi-Pyrénées, France

  Hassan Abbas had been getting increasingly concerned. The last message he had received from Dmitri Trushenko had been a routine transmission, just a confirmation that the last two phases of the operation were proceeding on schedule, but there had been nothing since. He had anticipated a further message when the bomb convoy reached the English Channel, and certainly one when the London weapon had been safely delivered.

  He had sent Trushenko an encrypted email by the usual route, just after six that afternoon and he had waited anxiously by the computer, his Internet connection active, for a reply. At nine, having heard nothing from wherever Trushenko had gone to ground, Abbas decided to check the status of the Krutaya computer through the dummy sex site in Arizona.

  As usual, he accessed the page containing the hidden code, waited for the 404 error to be displayed and pressed the ‘Refresh’ button three times. His Internet connection was immediately transferred to the Krutaya mainframe, the screen cleared and the familiar winking cursor appeared in the top left-hand corner, waiting for his input. Abbas typed the single word ‘manalagna’ – the result of a private joke he had shared years earlier with Sadoun Khamil – and watched as his personal welcome message appeared on the monitor.

  Hammersmith, London

  Richter put the disk and plastic tray down on Simpson’s desk and slumped wearily into a chair. Simpson looked at him questioningly.

  ‘That’s the complete list of the weapon locations,’ Richter said. ‘Those at the top are the European sites, the ones at the bottom are the bombs across the pond, and the floppy disk has file copies that the CIA can use.’

  ‘Excellent,’ Simpson said, and rang for a courier. ‘I’ll get them sent over to the Embassy right away so they can get their techies started on the disarming process.’

  ‘You’ll need these as well,’ Richter said, handing over a couple of sheets of paper. ‘They’re copies of the instructions Professor Dewar gave me. If the Americans are going to dismantle the weapons manually they’ll need to know the sequence of wires they have to cut to disable the anti-handling devices.’

  Simpson picked up a couple of sheets from the plastic tray and glanced at the information printed on them. ‘Remarkably comprehensive,’ he murmured. ‘I presume you’ve told Baker to keep a copy for our records?’

  Richter nodded. ‘It’ll be in a file on the computer so we can print copies whenever we need them.’

  There was a soft knock at the door and the courier entered. Simpson handed over the disk and the sheets relating to the American weapons and told him to take them straight to the American Embassy. The door had just closed behind him when the internal phone buzzed. Simpson picked it up, listened for a few seconds, then looked over at Richter. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘I’ll send him down.’

  ‘What is it?’ Richter asked as Simpson replaced the handset.

  ‘That was Baker,’ Simpson said, ‘and we may not be out of the woods yet. He says a new user has just logged on to the Krutaya computer.’

  ‘What? He told me that was impossible,’ Richter said.

  Simpson shrugged. ‘No idea – it’s not my field. We’d better get down there.’

  Le Moulin au Pouchon , St Médard, near Manciet, Midi-Pyrénées, France

  Hassan Abbas first checked to see if there were any other users on the system, but found only one – General Modin. That puzzled him, because he had been told by Trushenko that the general was one of the two senior Russian military officers who would be accompanying the last neutron bomb to London. The only way Modin could be connected to Krutaya would be through a computer at the London Russian Embassy, which meant that the bomb had to have been delivered already. Unless, Abbas rationalized, Modin had gone on ahead of the convoy for some reason. That could be it.

  He checked the status of the London weapon and, as he expected, found that the system reported it as still being in transit. Then he accessed the network utilities module and checked the call origin. Modin’s call to Krutaya had been placed from a London number, but routed through a Moscow exchange. That made sense. Obviously Modin had for some reason travelled ahead of the weapon and was now waiting in London for its arrival and positioning.

  Abbas checked the overall system readiness, and then looked at the status of several of the individual weapons in both America and Europe, a routine he had followed many times before. All appeared to be in order, and he was about to exit from the system when something unexpected caught his eye.

  Hammersmith, London

  ‘How the hell did this happen, and who is he?’ Richter demanded, walking into the Computer Suite two paces in front of Simpson.

  Baker shrugged helplessly. ‘He’s a new user, but there’s no record of him in the username table. That means he’s got his own personal backdoor code.’

  ‘In English, please, Baker,’ Simpson snapped.

  ‘A backdoor code is a shortcut most programmers use. They incorporate a specific code-word that’s known only to them, and which will allow them back into the system at any time, without going through the normal log on procedure. I’ve effectively deleted all the authorized users by scrambling their passwords, but this guy—’ he pointed at the screen ‘—just popped up out of nowhere, so that’s the only possible way he could have got inside.’

  ‘OK,’ Richter growled, sitting down. ‘Who is he and what can you do about him?’

  ‘The first is easy. He’s using identity “Dernowi”, but that doesn’t sound like a Russian name to me.’

  Richter shook his head. ‘It doesn’t sound Russian because it isn’t, as far as I know. Could it be a nickname?’

  ‘Almost certainly, but that doesn’t help. And the bad news is that because user Dernowi is using a backdoor code, I can’t delete him, change the code or stop him getting into the system again. And the really bad news is he can definitely eliminate us if he wants to.’

  ‘So what are you doing?’

  ‘At the moment, absolutely nothing. I’m still logged on as Modin – which Dernowi has checked, by the way, so he knows we’re here and also knows that we’re calling from London – but I’m doing nothing else. I’m hoping he’ll know Modin is an authorized user and he won’t even think of altering his password or deleting his username.’

  Richter sat silently for a moment, staring at the screen. ‘The identity he’s using,’ he said, ‘it doesn’t sound like a contraction of a Russian word to me. Can you check it somehow?’

  ‘I’m way ahead of you,’ Baker said. ‘I’ve been running a dictionary program for the last five minutes on my laptop.’ He got up and wal
ked across to the small desk in the corner. ‘It’s finished,’ he announced, ‘but I don’t think it helps much. There’s no exact match to “Dernowi”, but the closest is in Yiddish, believe it or not, and it translates as “The Prophet”.’

  ‘Yiddish?’ Richter said. ‘That makes no sense. The Russians would never work with the Jews. This has to be someone’s idea of a joke. OK, you said Dernowi had checked where Modin was calling from – can you do the same with him?’

  Baker nodded. ‘Probably. I’ll visit some pages at random and include the network utilities section.’ Two minutes later Baker passed Richter a post-it note on which he’d written an eleven digit number, starting with ‘33’. Richter looked at it then gave it to Simpson.

  ‘France?’ Simpson asked. ‘He’s calling from France? Southern France?’

  ‘How do you know it’s southern France?’ Richter asked.

  ‘The third digit,’ Simpson replied. ‘It identifies the region – I have a friend with a house in the Gers. You’re sure of this, Baker?’

  Baker shrugged. ‘That’s what the system’s reporting. He’s using a server in America – in Arizona, in fact – to bounce his call, but his actual origin is France.’

  ‘This makes no sense,’ Richter muttered, repeating himself. ‘A new user, with backdoor access to a Russian weapon control system, with a Yiddish username and ringing from the South of France? What’s he doing on the system?’

  ‘No idea.’

  ‘No, I meant what is he actually doing now?’

  ‘Oh, OK. He’s been checking the weapon readiness, but he hasn’t moved off this page for a couple of minutes.’

  ‘And what page is that?’

  ‘The one for the Gibraltar demonstration weapon,’ Baker replied. ‘Which,’ he added, ‘shows that the device has already been detonated.’

  Le Moulin au Pouchon , St Médard, near Manciet, Midi-Pyrénées, France