by D S Kane
Avram pointed his head back toward the elevator, meaning, We must leave here now. At once. He started walking casually back toward the elevator.
* * *
Ann saw a male face appear in front of her in the scene created in her mind. The face grimaced in pain and then disappeared in swirling flames. She turned and faced the CypherGhost’s mindglow. “What the fuck was that?”
The CypherGhost shrugged. “Dunno. Never tried this before. It’s all new to me.”
Ann searched for traces of Fergusson’s messages but found nothing more than she’d already seen. Then, a text message from Cassie was routed to her. “Fergusson’s dead. We have no leads anymore. You might as well be conscious. Okay?”
The CypherGhost shook her head. “No. You go. But I want to get a better feel for this reality and see if there are any additional leads I can uncover. I’ll see you later, Little Noisy.”
Ann shifted back into normal reality. She felt very weak and was both tired and hungry. She sat up and took a few deep breaths to steady herself before she rose and walked into the kitchen.
Ann ate everything that remained on the top shelf of the fridge, then started in on the second shelf. She was midway through it when she heard the safe house’s door open. She could hear Cassie and Jon talking. It was obvious they weren’t happy.
Her mouth stuffed with cold roasted chicken and pasta leftovers, Ann staggered toward the noise of Avram’s voice.
Cassie smiled at Ann. “How do you feel?”
Ann forced herself to swallow. “Tired and hungry. And here’s something else. When I presented the CypherGhost with evidence that she was being used, she switched sides again. I still don’t trust her, but she delivered value today. Oh, and not from the bedroom where you have her tied up. She appeared in my vision. Mom, she also swallowed a butt-load of Bug-Loks. She’s still in the alternate reality, digging around.”
Cassie frowned. “Don’t trust her. I feel it in my gut. She’s more trouble than she’s worth.”
Ann nodded. “Probably. But I think you just feel that way because we were fucking each other’s eyeballs out.” Ann smirked.
Cassie frowned and turned away. “Not funny.”
Ann chuckled. But she still didn’t trust the CypherGhost, although she felt she’d have to convince the woman that she did.
* * *
The CypherGhost felt her energy level diminishing fast. There was less she could do, and it took her longer to do anything. Her hands were shaking. She was running out of time. She focused on her most important objective, routing every bit of her remaining energy into the connection between her and those who had sent her to the Sashakovich family. She messaged, “I completed the objective you sent me to achieve. Fergusson is dead.”
The reply stunned her: “Kill Ann Silbey Sashakovich.”
The CypherGhost: “But, why? She’s the one who discovered how to use the Bug-Lok.”
“Exactly. She has served her purpose. Now she’s become too dangerous. Soon, you won’t be able to control her.”
The CypherGhost: “I can’t kill her. She’s more powerful than me.”
“Then you have failed us.”
Seconds passed without the CypherGhost conjuring a reply. Then she heard the instant message, rendered from text into sound within her head: “Kill her, or try and die. Do nothing and you will be on our kill list.”
The CypherGhost disconnected from alternate reality and reemerged in normal reality. She was sure that she’d reestablished Ann’s feeling of trust in her. So now, there was more she might convince Ann to do. If she was lucky, she might even get Ann to untie her. And setting her free was something she needed. If she was free, Ann’s trust would become moot. With this threat, now the FHS group was her biggest worry.
She was terrified, shivering on the bed where she had been bound.
The game had changed again.
PART IV
Every major player is working on this technology of artificial intelligence. As of now, it’s benign… but I would say that the day is not far off when artificial intelligence as applied to cyber warfare becomes a threat to everybody.
—Ted Bell, technical writer and novelist
CHAPTER 41
December 11, 8:14 p.m.
Irwin Sadowski’s apartment,
1329 Connecticut Avenue, Washington DC
Irwin Sadowski sat in his living room, a lamp by the couch glowing yellow with light. An unfinished and now cold cup of tea and a half-finished toasted cheese sandwich sat on a plate on the mahogany coffee table.
He read the instant message on his cellphone, and scowled. The person who’d sent the message to him, his handler, wanted something else, something new. He still didn’t know who that person was. And he didn’t want to know. But he still hadn’t been paid by his handler and was in critical need of cash. Initially, his handler’s promise of money had been enough. Now, it was no longer enough, especially given the task he was next responsible for completing. The message was short and cryptic, as usual:
Need updated status of your rogue hacker. Is she still reliable? Will she follow the order you give her? Also need a plan to terminate her if you suspect her reliability. Answer ASAP.
Sadowski had never been asked before to kill a human being. This message troubled him greatly, and he was sure it would give him nightmares. He stared at the cup of tea and the cheese sandwich as if the answer to his problem might lie in the cup or between two slices of bread.
But no such luck as the minutes passed. When his handler sent another text containing just a question mark, Sadowski cursed. He texted: “I haven’t any reason to believe the hacker can’t or won’t perform as instructed.” He sent the reply.
The more he thought about it, the more he believed that the hacker’s close relationship with Ann Sashakovich finally seemed to be backfiring.
He might need a new plan. If he couldn’t deliver what his handler wanted, Sadowski knew his own life would be in danger. Maybe it’s time to get out of Dodge…
* * *
Standing before the roaring fire in his country house’s fireplace, SSC board member and plurality stockholder Cy DeSpain pocketed his cellphone. He wondered if Sadowski would become a growing problem for the group of corporations patiently waiting for the inevitable sequence of events that would turn the United States from a virtual corporatocracy into an actual corporatocracy.
He scratched the mole on the back of his bald head. Patience, he told himself. We have come so far. Twenty years ago, when the idea emerged from a small group of CEOs of a few of the largest corporations to replace the federal government, it was nothing more than a pipe dream, beyond any chance of achievement. Conspiracy theories couldn’t have been more exaggerated than the idea that fewer than fifty corporations could rule the United States first, and then the entire world. But after they had demonstrated to each other how much better they were than professional politicians at providing for the common good of each country’s population, they gathered privately and decided that they should take over the entire planet’s governance. Technology had gifted them a way of meeting without ever leaving their headquarters buildings and improvements in technology had ensured that their plans remained enclosed within a wall of encrypted secrecy.
The corporate CEOs used a privately developed version of encrypted Skype, Hangouts, and other, even more secure communications. Terrorists had made their use more common and gave them better encryption technology over time.
By then, each of these corporations had all become multinationals, and when they had decided that they wanted to rule the world, they knew they could do it country by country. The question before them at the time was, when? When the Arab Spring had failed, it left behind a stream of lessons for the corporate CEOs, showing them how they might succeed when their predecessors had failed.
And recently, the federal government of the United States had demonstrated just how inept it was at maintaining civil order. By majority vote, the CEOs had
decided in their most recent private meeting, Now is the time. The group’s meetings had become more frequent, more regular. They had formed focus groups, then project groups, and now, finally, tactical operations were in process.
He checked his blood glucose level on his continuous glucose monitor. 276. Way too high. He administered five units of insulin and sat in one of the leather sofas in his hunting room. He was having progressively more difficulty in controlling his type 1 diabetes. He gritted his teeth. Nasty complications were no longer on his personal horizon. The complications were happening now.
* * *
The CypherGhost emerged from her Bug-Lok meditative fugue state. Someone had untied her. She was sure it had been Ann’s doing, and she was sure it was a sign Ann did trust her. She struggled to stand. She flexed her arms and legs, rose and found a bathrobe in the closet. She walked into the kitchen and grabbed leftovers from the fridge. All that was left there was salad vegetables and salad dressing. After stuffing herself, she looked for Ann, and found the woman lying in her parents’ bed. The CypherGhost lay beside her and touched her head.
“Wha?”
“Ann, sorry to wake you, but we need to talk.”
“Can’t it wait?”
“No. Listen, the people who sent me to you want me to kill you.”
Ann’s eyes opened wide. “No shit. I bet you don’t even know who sent you. Do you?”
“No. I thought I did, but now, not so much.”
Ann howled with laughter. “Ya think? I’ve been wondering who really sent you for nearly a week. Listen, from what we’ve already discovered, if you take a step back, it’s obvious there are not two groups of hackers, but three. The white hats, the black hats, and your other group. They might be a faction of the government, or they might be corporations working together. What they aren’t is another set of white hats.”
The CypherGhost nodded. “Yeah. I think you got it right. I have a proposal. What if we take a death photo of you and I send it to them to show that you’ve been murdered? Then we can work together at figuring out who is behind the group that really sent me.”
Ann shook her head. “Won’t work. Every time we’re inside the Bug-Lok universe, we leave traces behind. I can see them. They linger for hours, maybe even days. It’s just possible your phantom group has hackers as capable as I am. If so, they’d notice, too.”
“Do your ‘traces’ have a signature? Can they tell who left the traces?”
Ann thought for a few seconds. “Not sure. If the traces aren’t distinctive, then we could try what you suggest. We’ll need to research it. But you’ve never noticed the traces?”
“Nope. You’re just better at this than me.”
Ann was silent again. She tilted her head. “So, if you didn’t try to kill me, does that mean I can trust you?”
The CypherGhost nodded, then kissed Ann. “”I guess so.” She pulled open Ann’s blouse. “In for a penny, in for a pound.” Her hands touched Ann’s breasts, then she pushed her tongue over one of Ann’s nipples. “Want me?”
CHAPTER 42
December 12, 6:53 a.m.
Pentagon, Washington DC
SSC board member Cy DeSpain had arrived at the Pentagon over two hours ago for this meeting he’d specially scheduled with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It had taken him nearly an hour to get through security.
Now he stood at the rear of the conference room watching the Joint Chiefs in their huddle. When they finally took their seats, DeSpain walked to the lectern. He took a deep breath. “Good morning, and thank you for permitting me to address you all. Over the last three decades, SSC has been a trusted provider of technology to the military of the United States. As a board member of SSC, I have enjoyed a warm professional relationship with each of you, and thank you for the benefits our relationship has provided to my company. Today, I have a proposal for you to consider. Please consider this carefully. If you decline, you may have inadvertently condemned the empire of the United States to its gradual termination.”
He scanned their faces, filled with arrogance and doubt. “Over the last few years, there has been a steady erosion of the public’s confidence in our government. I’m sure you can see that our experiment in democracy has failed. The government itself is beyond control, disorganized, in chaos. Our citizenry has lost all respect for every one of the branches of government, and as a result, some are not motivated to participate in the electoral process, and others want radical change in how they are governed. Our economy has been damaged by the inevitable result. And our power in the world has dissipated. None of our allies currently trust us.”
This time he saw a desperate interest in their faces. “What if there was some way for our government to reassert control over its fate and the fate of our world? Either we’ll need to force those we’ve elected to work together, or we’ll need to replace them wholesale, with politicians who want to work together, to compromise for the common good. But, for that to happen, we’d need the military ready to use its sharp stick. We’d need you to force our leaders to do the bidding of the people who know best what is good for America. And those people, my friends, are the military. Those people are you. You would need to take a much more proactive role in ruling our country. Would this new way of governing interest you?”
He waited. Two of the Joint Chiefs leaned in toward the others and a quiet conversation ensued. He continued waiting. As the seconds turned into minutes, he smiled. Just maybe, this might bring about what he desired. And this doubt in the country’s current direction was what his plans were about to force, no matter what the Joint Chiefs decided here and now.
A four-star general from the Army turned toward him. “What would we need to do? You come from the technology sector. What help could you provide?”
DeSpain took a deep breath. Yes! “The technology sector seeds our economy in every way. We make international and regional trade possible. We make domestic trade nearly friction free, and economically speaking, those tech developments make international trade necessary. We cause the continuous growth of businesses and education, and as a result, trade is potentially open-ended. Conversely, by ceasing technological development for a short period of time, we could precipitate an economic crisis in order to give the military an excuse it could use to alter the climate in which government operates. We’ve done this in many other countries, at many other times. We could do it here and now.”
An admiral shook his head. “What you’re suggesting is a coup d’état. It’s unthinkable. It’s treason.”
DeSpain nodded. “Yes, a coup is unthinkable. But the hackers who could alert the Fifth Estate are, in large part, now out of the way. So if a coup were to happen, it would happen quickly and quietly. No one can stop that changeover until it had already been implemented. The ensuing change would begin in stages, slowly and building up speed. First, new technological developments would be ceased temporarily. That has already started with the end of Moore’s law now in sight. One of the results is that the Congress has stopped showing up at the Capitol. Several are now over the age of eighty. They might simply die. Once less than half are able to govern, you’ll have your excuse. Hernandez has been an ineffective president since he took office. More of a caretaker. He unwittingly encouraged the Russians and Chinese to invade America less than a year ago. He deserves replacement. We can do better. We need someone running America who will take the economic welfare of our citizens seriously. I’m not suggesting you run the country with a junta. I’m suggesting that democratic elections have yielded subpar leaders. You would have a real voice in the selection of our ‘administrators.’ Our successor bureaucrats.”
Once again, the Joint Chiefs spoke to each other in low tones DeSpain couldn’t hear clearly.
The head of the Joint Chiefs shook his head. “I can’t endorse this action. Thank you for your time. This meeting is over.” He stood, and the others followed. They walked from the conference room.
DeSpain smiled. He knew they could never a
dmit they admired his suggestion. But he suspected they were still thinking about it. Plant the seed and the tree may grow.
He might not live to see the result, but that was acceptable. As the elevator doors closed and he was finally alone, he checked his cellphone to ensure that the entire meeting had been recorded to the Video folder on the cell’s micro-SD card. And, yes, it was. The tie tack he’d worn had recorded the meeting through its embedded videocam.
He thought about how he could use the video to force them to do his will, and that thought made him grin. In fact, he had to restrain himself from laughing.
* * *
Ann woke with a headache the size of a large barn. She knew that another of her Bug-Loks was shutting down. She’d have to tend to it soon, before it left a scar on her medulla oblongata as it broke apart.
She rolled away from the CypherGhost and dropped back into the alternate head-space created by the Bug-Loks. She counted the ones still working: twenty-seven. Over twenty had gone dead inside her during the previous three days. So, the more they are used, the sooner they fail. Soon she would have lost the critical mass of units needed to “see” the internet and interact with it. In her mindspace, she turned off the unit that was failing. She wondered if the CypherGhost was experiencing the same thing? Ann hadn’t told her the consequences of not turning off a failing unit… the scarring that might cause a stroke.
She quietly left the bed and dressed for the day. Then she walked from the bedroom into the kitchen where her notebook computer awaited. She poured a cup of coffee. This early in the day, she was the only one awake. Cassie, Jon, and Avram would be up soon, though, and she needed to research if there was any way to tell what the life expectancy of her remaining Bug-Loks might be. She would have to speak with Cassie, since her mom might be able to coax Michael Drapoff to investigate the Bug-Lok specifications in more detail. She could hear Cassie stirring in the bedroom she and Lee occupied. She could hear Lee talking with Cassie.
