The Darkfall Switch

by David Lindsley

  ‘You’ve got spies in the Pentagon?’ Foster questioned, his eyebrows raised in surprise.

  Ballantyne laughed and said, ‘Not spies exactly. But we have many day-to-day dealings with the Pentagon on defence matters, and we’ve asked our people to keep an eye on that area.

  ‘But that’s another issue. The main point is that the US Administration denies any conspiracy.’

  ‘That’s a good one,’ Foster said. ‘Surely we’ve got enough evidence by now to convince them that we know the truth?’

  ‘You’d have thought so,’ Ballantyne said, ‘but they stoutly deny it. However, we’ve had a tipoff that it was a way-out idea that was initiated a year or two ago by the previous administration – they were rather hawkish you know – and that when the new people discovered its existence they didn’t like it at all, started to shut it down and tried to cover up any hint that it had ever existed.’

  ‘But Worzniak’s office is still there!’ Foster said. ‘Even though your people have reported that they’re dismantling it now.’

  ‘Ah yes,’ Ballantyne said. ‘There does seem to be some frantic work in progress. But to admit that we are aware of it would tell the Americans of our people informing on the activities. All in all, it’s better that doesn’t happen.’ He looked at Foster before going on, ‘And, anyway, we think that the cover-up has now taken a new turn.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Foster asked.

  Ballantyne cleared his throat. ‘Within the past few hours,’ he said, ‘Powerplant Dynamics have issued a software patch to their clients in the UK. And we believe it’s gone out worldwide.’

  ‘They told us they were going to do that,’ Foster said, ‘when we met them in Denver.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Ballantyne replied.

  Forsyth now spoke for the first time. ‘We’d like you to have a look at it, if you would, Foster,’ he said. ‘As soon as you can.’

  ‘That’ll be easy,’ Foster said. ‘I’ve already spoken to my contact at Queensborough and he said he’d tell me when he receives the patch. He wants me to look at it too.’

  ‘Good man!’ Forsyth said.

  Foster looked at Margaret Andrews. He had never worked out her part in this whole saga. Now she had sat through their discussion, looking from one to another, saying nothing. Her expression showed concern. Or was it something else?

  Soon afterwards, the meeting ended. They shook hands and went their separate ways.

  Bill Kirkland leant over Foster’s shoulder and looked at the screen. Foster had found a message waiting for him when he returned to his houseboat, telling him that the software patch had arrived from Denver. He had rushed up to Queensborough and was now sitting at the control desk of the power station’s simulator.

  ‘I’ve reloaded the original software,’ Kirkland said. ‘After your last visit we discovered that the system in the simulator was different from the ones on the plant.’

  Foster nodded. ‘It was minus the Darkfall routine. That self-erases when it’s invoked.’

  ‘Yes. So we downloaded the plant software into this.’ He tapped the disk.

  ‘Good,’ Foster said. ‘So what we’ve got here is exactly what was here before I invoked the Darkfall Switch?’

  ‘As far as I can tell, yes.’

  ‘OK. And you’ve got the new patch?’

  ‘Here.’ Kirkland handed him a shining silver disk.

  Foster opened the drive, dropped the disk into it and pressed lightly on the drawer. It closed softly and after a few seconds a message appeared, saying that new software was about to be installed. After a further pause, another message appeared saying the installation was ready and asking for confirmation to proceed. Foster clicked on the screen’s YES button and for an instant the screen went blank.

  ‘Of course,’ Kirkland said, while they waited, ‘on the real plant we’d only do that during a shutdown. With the plant down and idle.’

  Then a new message appeared on the screen:

  Installation complete. Proceed?

  Once again, Foster clicked on YES.

  The display switched to the command screen. Foster glanced at Kirkland and asked, ‘Shall I start it up?’ He was ready to initiate a simulated start-up of the generating unit, using the modified software.

  Kirkland nodded his assent.

  Under Foster’s control, the simulator began the process of starting up. In reality, on the real plant outside their window, all sorts of actions would have occurred as the start-up proceeded; valves would have opened and closed, pumps would have started and stopped. Here, all these actions were replicated in software.

  But it wasn’t quite happening in real time. Foster had selected the option for making the start-up procedure run faster than it would have in real life. In reality, the huge machines in the plant outside their office would have needed to be gently warmed up to prevent the creation of damaging thermal stresses. The real start-up would have taken hours. Here, for the purposes of training, these delays could be eliminated.

  Nevertheless, it was several minutes before the simulated plant was up and running, generating an imaginary few hundred megawatts of power. When it was complete, Kirkland took over from Foster at the desk and tried initiating several actions that would be common in real life.

  ‘It all seems OK,’ he confirmed after a while.

  ‘Good!’ Foster said. ‘Now let’s try to crash it.’

  While Kirkland tapped at his keyboard, carefully scrutinizing the new displays that appeared at each click, Foster plugged his laptop into a port on the back of the control desk, slipped Matthews’ disk into the drive and set about following the steps Luke Proctor had taken at the outset of this affair and brought down the plant.

  Now, nothing happened.

  ‘That’s OK,’ Foster said at the end of his work. ‘They do seem to have fixed it.’

  Kirkland gave an annoyed snort. ‘I could have done that myself,’ he said, staring at his own screen.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘I’ve been looking at the new software,’ Kirkland said, pointing at the screen. ‘It’s gone.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Gone!’ Kirkland said. ‘Look, here’s where the Darkfall Switch used to be. But now it’s gone.’

  Foster peered at the screen before breathing, ‘The crafty sods.’

  Then he looked up and asked, ‘If I hadn’t been around, what would you have done, Bill? When the disk with the patch landed on your desk?’

  Kirkland found a single sheet of paper lying on the console and said, ‘This is the letter that came with the disk, Dan.’ Foster read it carefully. It said: ‘Urgent Security Notification. A potentially dangerous security issue has been identified, and users of the Generation 300 system are advised to install the enclosed software update to their systems as a matter of urgency.’

  Foster shut his eyes briefly. ‘So you’d have done that at the next shutdown.’

  ‘Yup!’

  ‘And most plants are two-shifted these days,’ Foster observed. This meant that the power stations operated for two eight-hour periods every 24-hour day, and were shut down overnight.

  ‘Yes,’ Kirkland confirmed. ‘This arrived yesterday. So almost everybody will have installed the new software by now. In fact, I took a risk in holding back. If anything had happened – and sod’s law says it would have happened then – I would have been hanged, drawn and quartered for not following that instruction.’

  ‘But you got away with it,’ Foster said.

  ‘For once, yes.’

  But while they were speaking a grim realization had begun to dawn on Foster. As it reached its conclusion, he shook his head in despair.

  Even as they spoke, all remaining traces of the Darkfall subroutine were being removed from every affected power station around the world.

  The evidence he had hoped to collect was slipping out of his fingers at this very moment. Even if he acted fast, there was no way of stopping users around the world from doing what
Kirkland had just done.

  The evidence was gone.

  THIRTEEN

  Ring-a-ring of Roses

  Foster was awakened from a deep sleep by the insistent ringing of his telephone. He had returned from Queensborough in a sombre mood, dejected that he had lost his battle – and, with it, probably the whole war. He had rung Grant and given him the bad news, then he’d prepared and eaten a light supper and gone to bed. He was feeling dog tired, and had soon fallen into a deep, dreamless sleep, which this annoying sound had now broken.

  He growled in irritation and prayed that the caller would soon give up. But he or she didn’t, and the ordeal was ended only when the answering service cut in. He looked at his watch: it was only 6.30 a.m. Some people had no consideration for others, or any sense.

  But his sleep had been broken and it was impossible to return to it, so, after a few moments, he climbed out of bed and sat with his elbows on his knees, holding his head in his hands as he tried to marshal his thoughts. It was futile; so after a few minutes he picked up the phone and looked at the display. It simply said ‘Number withheld’. Then he dialled the answering service, only to find that the caller had left no message.

  He tossed it back on to the bed and rose. Time for a jog; that should help clear his head. He slipped on his running pants and vest and went out into the cold air. It was still fairly dark, but the sky was lightening to the east and there was enough light to let him enjoy the scenery as he set off.

  At the end of the run he picked up The Times from his newsagent before looping back to the boat. He boarded, tossed the newspaper on to the galley table, ground some coffee beans, put them into the percolator and switched it on before stripping off his clothes and going into the shower.

  When he emerged he picked up the mobile phone, looked at the display again and cursed; he had missed a call while the shower had been running; again the display gave no indication of the caller’s name or number. He shrugged his shoulders, dressed and poured a coffee to drink while he cooked his breakfast.

  He was reading the paper while eating breakfast when the mobile rang again. This time he connected and immediately recognized the caller’s voice: it was Joe Worzniak.

  ‘Good God!’ he exclaimed. ‘I didn’t expect to hear from you again.’

  ‘Just cut the crap, Foster,’ Worzniak growled. ‘We need to talk.’

  Foster’s eyebrows arched upwards. ‘Go ahead?’

  ‘No. Face to face. I’m at Heathrow.’ Foster reeled back in shock. Worzniak, here, in Britain? But the American went on, ‘We gotta be fast. Tell me where we can meet, today; somewhere that’s absolutely secure.’

  Foster thought feverishly.

  ‘There’s a café under the bridge at Richmond,’ he explained. ‘You’ll get there in half an hour in a cab.’

  ‘Richmond?’

  Foster smiled. ‘Richmond upon Thames,’ he explained; he wouldn’t really want the American to be taken, expensively and fruitlessly, by a cab-driver to the other Richmond in Yorkshire. Not really. ‘On the river:’ he explained, ‘the Thames. The cab driver’ll know.’

  ‘OK. Just be there, Foster.’

  His mobile rang again a while later. It was turning into a busy day.

  This time the caller was Janet. ‘Am I out of favour, Dan?’ she asked.

  ‘No, why?’

  ‘We haven’t spoken for days, and I’m missing you.’

  ‘I’m popular today. Seems everybody wants to talk to me!’

  ‘What?’

  He explained about the call from Worzniak and then asked where she was.

  ‘I’m on the train to Kingston,’ she replied.

  He looked at his watch. ‘Already?’

  ‘Yes. I couldn’t sleep, Dan,’ she said. ‘Can we meet? Now?’

  ‘I’ve just told Joe I’ll meet him in under half an hour.’

  ‘Can’t I come along?’

  He thought about it briefly, then said, ‘OK. Where’ve you got to?’

  ‘Earlsfield. I could’ve called you before I left the flat, but I thought you’d try and talk me out of meeting. I felt that you’d take pity on me if I was already on the way.’

  He laughed.

  ‘All right. Come straight to the boat.’

  Earlier, while he had been making his plans to meet Worzniak, he had given some thought to where it would be safe to meet. The American’s reference to needing somehere secure implied that he was at some sort of risk. If so, they would be safest on a boat. On land, any watchers or pursuers would be difficult to identify; on the river it would be harder for anybody to get near them, and far easier for him to spot them if they did manage it.

  He loaded the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher and changed into a sweater and jeans. While he dressed he thought about the morning’s events and his plans. He wondered whether to call Grant and tell him what had happened but decided not to – not for the moment, at least.

  He found a couple of light sweaters and put them on a seat. One was for Janet: it would be a little on the large size for her, but better than nothing as protection against the autumnal chill of the wind on the river.

  When he heard the familiar sound of her footsteps on the gangway he picked up the sweaters, slipped one on and went out to greet her. She flung herself in his arms.

  ‘I want to be here with you, Dan,’ she said. ‘I’m missing you.’

  He desperately wanted to hold her, but there was an urgent need for speed. There were other, far more pressing matters to be dealt with first.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said gently, passing her the other sweater. ‘Put this on. We’re taking the tender.’

  ‘The tender?’ she said, holding the garment up and smiling at it before putting it over her shoulders. As he’d known, it was too large for her but it would suffice.

  He smiled, but said nothing and grasped her elbow, led her to the stern and stepped into the little boat – a snowy white Bullfrog 11.5 with twin Yamaha outboards. It included an additional fuel tank that he had fitted to provide an extended cruising range.

  Janet looked down and slipped off her high-heeled shoes, gathering them up in her hands before descending the little ladder under his guidance.

  ‘A boat trip,’ she said. ‘How nice!’

  He started the outboards and untied the warps. As they motored out into the mainstream he explained his thought about the comparative safety of a boat.

  ‘So we’ll just meet him at the café?’ she asked.

  ‘Yep. Perhaps have a coffee. Then back on board.’

  ‘On board? You’re bringing him here?’

  ‘No. On board the tender. I’ll go downstream where we can keep an eye out for anybody who may be following. I’ll work out exactly where to go afterwards.’

  She settled back in the stern and looked at the scenery slipping past as they headed down towards Teddington lock. At this hour there was little activity at the lock and they were quickly through, and Foster eased the throttle open as they entered the jurisdiction of the Port of London Authority.

  At Richmond he tied up to mooring rings at the promenade and jumped ashore. Then he held out his hand and helped her get up alongside. There were only a few early strollers, dog-walkers and joggers in view and when they took up seats in the café there were just three other customers in the place. He went over to the counter and bought coffee.

  While they waited, he asked seriously, ‘Has anything happened?’

  She stared out of the window and spent some time gathering her thoughts before replying, ‘No. It’s just that I haven’t seen you for days. Then there’s Tina and Alex. They’re a strange couple – living their separate lives but being together still.’

  ‘They’ve been like that as long as I’ve known them.’

  ‘Me too. I suppose it’s a sort of happiness; but it wouldn’t be enough for me, Dan. I’d want more.’ She looked around to see that nobody was within earshot, and then gazed seriously into his eyes before quietly saying, ‘They
don’t sleep together, you know. Well, they share the same bed, but that’s all.’

  ‘Yes, I do know. Alex told me once, back in Hong Kong. We were in a bar and he was in his cups.’

  ‘Tina says it isn’t anything new for married couples, or unusual. She says that in the past the landed gentry even had separate bedrooms.’

  ‘So I’ve heard,’ he said, grimacing. ‘But is she happy with the arrangement?’

  She frowned. ‘I think so,’ she replied eventually. ‘Yes, in a strange way, I think she is. I suppose that, as far as she was concerned, sex was a messy, unpleasant business that could be dispensed with as soon as possible after they’d got married.’

  ‘God!’ he exclaimed. A man reading a newspaper nearby looked up, and then returned his attention to the paper.

  ‘She gets on with her socializing,’ Janet said quietly, ‘and he spends all his time with his model boats.’

  ‘Doesn’t she think about how he feels?’ he asked. ‘Isn’t she worried that he’ll take up with another woman some day?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’ve never asked.’

  He scowled. ‘I’ve never asked Alex either.’

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘that may be all right for them, but it wouldn’t be enough for me.’

  ‘You mean you’d want sex?’ he asked jokingly.

  She gave an annoyed shake of her head. ‘No. It’s not just that. Loving each other, sharing things, being together as much as possible; that’s what I’d want.’