The Emperor's Revenge (The Oregon Files)

by Clive Cussler

  While the technicians in the moon pool prepped the underwater vehicles for deployment, Juan sat in the conference room as Gretchen, Murph, and Eric briefed him on their analysis of the computer data she had received about the bank heist. As usual, the two eager software experts were throwing around jargon he’d never heard before.

  “What’s a multipartite virus?” Juan asked.

  Murph, who was dressed in a black T-shirt that read I’m just here to establish an alibi, said, “It’s really impressive work. Most computer viruses infect the system in only one way. But a multipartite, also called a hybrid virus, infects along a variety of vectors, allowing it to propagate very easily and quickly. We think that’s what ShadowFoe installed when she got access to the Credit Condamine system.”

  “And there’s no way to use a backup to reinstall the system?”

  Eric shook his head. “That’s the insidious part of a multipartite virus. It installs itself in the root sector of a computer system, which means that even if you wipe it from memory, it’ll reinfect the computer as soon as the system starts up. It’s incredibly hard to get rid of completely unless you know what to look for.”

  “So our money is lost?”

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa!” said Murph, putting his hands up in a defensive posture. “No one said that. I’m not letting a virus eat up my money.”

  “The one good thing about these hybrid viruses,” Eric said, “is that they install themselves in a lot of places in the system, so there are lots of opportunities for us to find it. Once we can crack the underlying code, we should be able to dig it out.”

  “Have they detected this virus on any other bank’s system?” Juan asked Gretchen.

  She shrugged. “There’s no way to know without finding the algorithm used to design the virus. But Credit Condamine was closely connected to a number of other banks on a secure network. It’s possible that once ShadowFoe had penetrated the bank’s external security by kidnapping the president and using his biometric log-in, she had access to banks throughout Europe.”

  “Do you think the failure of the bank in Paris is the one she warned us about?”

  “Has to be. It’s too coincidental to be unrelated.”

  “So what’s the ultimate goal? To bring down the financial system one bank at a time unless they get some ransom?”

  “I doubt it. There are easier ways for hackers to take large sums of money from financial institutions. Just last year, we discovered that malware had been introduced in some of the biggest banks in the world through phishing emails. JPMorgan Chase and the Agricultural Bank of China were just a couple of them. The criminals observed banking operations for two years, directly siphoning off money to ATMs and phony accounts across the globe.”

  “How much was stolen?”

  “Banks aren’t exactly eager to share the news that their systems have been penetrated. Not good for the trust of depositors. But the estimates range as high as nine hundred million dollars.”

  Murph whistled, and Eric said, “Not bad, for two years of work.”

  “What I can’t understand,” Murph said, “is why Antonovich would be doing this. He’s already a billionaire. Now he has to get money by stealing it? Doesn’t make sense.”

  “There has to be a larger agenda at work,” Gretchen said. “My superiors at Interpol think that Antonovich could be trying to work his way back into the Kremlin’s good graces by helping the Russian government destabilize the West. If he brings down the financial system, even for a short time, it could enhance Russia’s negotiating power in the region.”

  “Or start a war,” Juan added. “If lasting damage is done, we could return to the days before the Berlin Wall fell. The embargo against Russia for the Ukraine incursion tanked the ruble and the markets in Moscow. If there’s evidence that Russia launched an all-out cyberattack on the European financial system, trading between the two blocs could shut down completely.”

  “I know some of our former colleagues wouldn’t mind that,” Gretchen said. “The CIA would love another showdown with the big bad Russians. The problem is that we have no proof that Antonovich was involved in the Credit Condamine heist. His yacht was in Monaco at the time, but it’s all circumstantial evidence.”

  “The Achilles sinking the Narwhal isn’t circumstantial,” Eric said. “I watched it happen.”

  Gretchen replied, “But the only link between the sinking and the banking infiltration is the Achilles’s presence in both places.”

  “Another question, then,” Murph said. “Why would ShadowFoe leave us a message if she never intended to collect a ransom?”

  “Because she knew what the response from banks would be,” Gretchen said. “The threat in her message would trigger an update in their cybersecurity software as soon as possible. Yesterday, a man was found dead in a Paris apartment, killed during a supposed robbery. He happened to be the chief of computer security for a firm that most European banks use. We think that ShadowFoe, or one of her accomplices, forced him to give them access to the updated software. Now the bank shutdown virus could be spreading throughout the entire industry and we’d never know it.”

  “The real mystery is how all of this is connected,” Juan said, ticking off the items on his fingers. “We’ve got a bank heist, to possibly bring down the European financial system; an attack on the electrical grid, which, so far, hasn’t had any major repercussions; a cryptic diary written by Napoleon Bonaparte before he was supposedly abducted from exile on St. Helena; and a billionaire so desperate to keep anyone from finding the treasure that was stolen during the invasion of Russia that he sinks a ship carrying a three-thousand-year-old stone column. Am I missing anything?”

  Murph smirked. “Well, when you put it that way, it sounds like those things should have nothing to do with each other.”

  “The only way we’ll figure it out,” Eric said, “is if we locate the treasure and find whatever Antonovich is trying to keep secret.”

  “And I know how you love to solve Russian mysteries,” Gretchen said, an inside joke about their Moscow mission together. Her accompanying smile didn’t escape the notice of Murph and Eric.

  Juan kept himself from blushing, otherwise he’d never hear the end of it. He pointed at the two coding experts. “If we retrieve the column, can you two decipher the clues that Napoleon left?”

  Eric and Murph exchanged a glance, then nodded confidently in unison.

  “Absolutely,” Murph said. “No problem.”

  “With enough time, of course,” Eric said.

  The two of them took their computers and left.

  “Do you think they really can do it?” Gretchen asked when they were alone.

  “They’re the best in the business,” Juan said. “If they can’t do it, no one can.”

  She leaned over and looked him in the eye. “You really trust your people, don’t you?”

  He returned her gaze. “I wouldn’t have hired them if I didn’t.”

  “That’s admirable. Not every boss is like that.”

  “This isn’t your typical company.”

  “I’ve noticed.” She paused, and then a smile curled at the corners of her mouth. “I forgot what you were like.”

  “I never forgot what you were like.”

  “Do you wonder how things could have been back at the CIA if we hadn’t been married? To other people, I mean.”

  Juan had often wondered the same thing over the last few days, but before he had a chance to answer, the intercom on the table buzzed.

  Gretchen sighed. “The captain’s work is never done.”

  Juan stabbed the button.

  “Your timing is impeccable,” he said into the microphone.

  “I do have a knack for that sort of thing,” Max replied, thinking he was getting a compliment.

  “Are we ready for the dive?”

  “Th
e equipment’s prepped, but we have a bit of an issue with the dive site.”

  “You can’t locate the container?”

  “No, we found it on the side-scan sonar. The problem is with the Narwhal.”

  “What about it?”

  “She settled on her side. On a slope. With the container holding the Jaffa Column still partially attached.”

  “I’m assuming that’s not what you were expecting,” Gretchen said.

  Juan slowly shook his head. He had hoped the Narwhal had settled on the sea bottom in an upright position, making the container recovery relatively easy. With her hull in an awkward position, the degree of difficulty had increased by a factor of ten.

  “Got it, Max,” Juan said with an eyebrow raised at Gretchen. “Not great.”

  “It could have been worse,” Max said, and Juan could picture his sarcastic grin. “At least she’s not upside down.”

  “Always the optimist is not something I would ever say to you. I’ll be down in a minute.”

  He closed the connection.

  “You’re going down in that sub?” Gretchen asked.

  “No, Max is driving Nomad today. I’m going to dive separately.”

  “Didn’t you say the wreck is at a depth of eight hundred feet?”

  “That I did.”

  “How can you do that? It’s way too deep for scuba gear, isn’t it?”

  “Four hundred feet is the limit for scuba; and to get down that far, you need to breathe a helium-oxygen mixture.”

  Gretchen put on a fake thoughtful expression. “Don’t tell me. You’re Aquaman.”

  Juan got up. “More like the Michelin Man.”

  She followed him out the door. “Now, this I have to see.”

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Juan and Gretchen arrived at the moon pool to find Nomad already lowered into the water. Because the pool was even with sea level outside, opening the keel doors didn’t cause the ocean to rush into the chamber. The salty tang of seawater filled the cavernous space, which bustled with noise and activity from techs getting their gear in order. Max’s head poked out of the sixty-five-foot-long sub’s hatch. Linda was visible inside the transparent nose, doing a last pre-dive check. Each of the manipulator arms reached out momentarily and clasped air like a crab snapping its claws. She would operate them while Max piloted the craft.

  Although Nomad could function untethered, when necessary, radio frequencies didn’t work underwater, and the backup acoustic communication was slow and unreliable. For this operation, the submersible was to be attached to the Oregon by an umbilical that allowed it to communicate with the ship.

  “How are you getting down there?” Gretchen asked.

  Juan pointed above her head, where what looked like a giant metal spacesuit hung from the gantry. A clear helmet sat on top of a stout orange torso that sprouted bulbous limbs with articulated joints. The arms ended in silver pincers for grasping objects. A huge backpack was mounted on the body, and twin thrusters were attached to each side that let it maneuver in the water just like a submarine.

  “Allow me to introduce you to Jim,” he said.

  Gretchen laughed. “He looks more like Waldo, if you ask me.”

  Juan waved for the technicians to begin lowering Jim to the deck. “It’s called an atmospheric diving suit. The first one was named Jim, after the inventor’s chief diver, back in the sixties. This model has been updated significantly since then, but I liked the name, so we kept it.”

  “It looks like the offspring of the Michelin Man and a pumpkin.”

  “The traffic cone coloring is for both visibility and style. This kind of rig is used by ocean drilling operations for maintenance, and most of the world’s biggest navies have them in their inventories.”

  “How do you walk in that thing? It looks like it weighs a ton.”

  “Only about six hundred pounds, since it’s made of wrought aluminum. But I don’t intend to be walking in Jim. There’s a pedal, which I operate with my good foot, for lateral and vertical movements, using thrusters.”

  When Jim was steady on the deck, technicians swung the backpack away from the suit on hinges.

  “This is where I get in,” Juan said.

  “I hope you and Jim have a fun time together. Good—”

  Juan interrupted her with his hand. He could tell she was about to say Good luck, which they never said aboard the Oregon before a dangerous mission. Although Juan wasn’t superstitious, the rest of the crew considered the phrase bad luck.

  “We don’t say that here. How about ‘I’ll see you when you get back’?”

  Gretchen grinned at the request. “My horoscope today said that’s acceptable. See you when you get back.”

  Juan climbed into his suit and went through the pre-dive check. Once everything was in order and Nomad had launched, Juan was sealed inside the Jim suit and lowered into the moon pool.

  “Do you copy, Max?” he said as water lapped at his helmet. Jim was tethered to the Oregon like Nomad was, so they could speak to each other directly.

  “Loud and clear, Juan,” Max replied. “Linda’s got the cable and we’re ready to dive.”

  He was talking about the thick steel cable from the deck crane that would be used to haul the container aboard.

  “I’m coming down.”

  The suit was released from the Oregon, and Juan adjusted the buoyancy so that he would descend at a slow and steady rate. The setting sun barely penetrated the gloom under the ship. In seconds, Juan was clear of the enormous doors along the keel.

  Max stayed by him in Nomad as they went down. By the time they reached a depth of a hundred feet, their powerful LED lamps provided the only illumination. The routine descent meant they had a few minutes before the real work got under way.

  Linda’s high-pitched voice came through the suit’s speakers. “Chairman, I’ve been reading up on Napoleon’s retreat from Moscow to see if we can narrow down where the treasure might be stashed.”

  “Self-storage unit?” Juan joked.

  “Unlikely,” she countered without missing a beat. “He started missing the monthly payments about two hundred years ago. The contents would have been auctioned off by now.”

  “Then I’d say it’s either underwater or underground.”

  “Most of the speculation says it’s underwater. With Napoleon’s horses dying left and right from the cold, they wouldn’t have had time to scout for caves. Sir Walter Scott’s nine-volume biography of Napoleon claims that the loot from Moscow was dumped into Semlev Lake, which is outside Smolensk.”

  “Could it still be there?”

  “I doubt it. The Communists conducted an exhaustive search of that lake, looking for the treasure, and came up empty.”

  “What do they think the treasure is?”

  “All the usual stuff. Silver and gold bullion, gold coins, precious gems, ancient weaponry. My favorite is the gold-plated cross that used to top Ivan the Great’s bell tower. To find it, we’ll have a lot of ground to cover. There are hundreds of lakes on the route Napoleon’s men took during their retreat.”

  “I have a hard time believing the treasure is in a lake.”

  “Why?” Linda asked.

  “For two reasons. The lakes would have been frozen at the time Napoleon was retreating. It would have been difficult for his men to dump the treasure in the water. They would have had to cut away the thick ice.”

  “And the second reason?”

  “How would he have gotten the treasure out of the lake, assuming he ever returned to Russia to retrieve it? If the lake was deep, it would have been difficult to recover the treasure with the technology of the time. And if it was that shallow, the lake would have been frozen solid.”

  “Which leaves us where?” Linda asked.

  “If it’s in the water, it would have to be in a river.
One that was fast moving enough so that it wouldn’t be frozen over by the time of the retreat. But it would have to be small enough so that it could be dammed and rerouted.”

  “Letting them collect it easily. You may be onto something.”

  Juan added, “If someone kidnapped Napoleon to help them find the treasure, all he’d have to do was point out where it was and they could do the rest. But since the loot has never resurfaced, we have to assume that their mission was unsuccessful.”

  “Then it’s still there,” Linda said.

  Max piped up. “If that’s true, what we’re looking at now may give us the answer.”

  Max must have seen the outline of the sunken ship seconds before it came into view for Juan, who could now see that the stern of the Narwhal was turned at an unnatural angle. Only the rear half of the ship’s name had survived the railgun’s tremendous blows.

  Just how tough this job would be didn’t sink in until Juan panned across deck, turned at more than ninety degrees with the cargo ship lying on its side.

  Most of the superstructure had been destroyed in the opening salvo and what was left of it was the only thing propping up the ship on the sloped seafloor. If it tipped over, the entire ship would go belly up, crushing the container underneath it and destroying any chance of salvaging the column.

  THIRTY-NINE

  As Juan glided along the sunken 300-foot-long ship, the awesome power of the railgun was evident in the catastrophic holes that had been torn in the Narwhal’s hull and deck. No wonder the ship had gone down so quickly. Some of the chasms were twenty feet across, with jagged metal protruding from the edges like the serrated teeth of a buzz saw. When he saw the extensive damage, he felt even more relieved that the Oregon had come out of the battle with the Achilles relatively unscathed.