Kill Switch

by James Phelan

  He’d already blown through ten minutes, carried away by what was being discussed.

  Time to go.

  He turned the ignition. Life. The sound was awesome. A thrum and a roar, the whole vehicle vibrating.

  He checked the map to General Brokaw’s house on Google Earth. Zoomed in on the local streets. Memorized them. He was good with maps; from hiking with his father to years in the military.

  Time.

  He clicked on the video file of Jasper Brokaw’s appearance. It went for two minutes three seconds. It was date and time stamped: just on two hours ago. Walker pressed play.

  “My . . .” Jasper looked up, off camera. As if looking to someone. He hesitated, then continued reading the prepared speech in his hands. “My fellow Americans. My name is Jasper Brokaw. Until yesterday I was an employee of the NSA. I’m a programmer, a coder, a hacker. I’m one of the best, working for years in the shadows to defend our nation—and by the time this has aired, you will all know my name.” He paused, swallowed. “You will know my name, because my employer, the United States government, will go into turmoil. They will go into a state of panic, and then distress, and then anger and vengeance. Finally, they, and you, will be on the other side of this. And it will be better. This will all occur not just because of what I have to say, but for what—for what, for who, I am.”

  Walker watched the feed, headphones in his ears.

  “As of this moment,” Jasper continued, “those who hold me captive are requesting that the US government shut down the Internet. How this will play out is entirely in the government’s hands.” He looked up to the camera, said, “They have the power to act, to stop what’s coming. I—they—suspect that it will take time. That the government, as usual, will drag their feet. They will argue and—” He looked back to the speech “—and they will bicker and talk in circles. But this isn’t up for negotiation. It’s inevitable. The timer is set. We’ve made our move, given you warning. Now it’s time for you to make your move. You’ve got thirty-six hours. You’ve seen our first data breach, and you will feel its effects. Our next cyber attack will occur in six hours. It will involve every federal employee. The next attacks will become more frequent, and more . . . threatening. How this ends is up to you.”

  The movie file ended at a black screen.

  •

  Captain Cam Harrington, US Army, stood with the five soldiers in his six-man team and waited. He was nervous. They were nervous.

  They’d never met the General before.

  They were a rag-tag group. The Dirty Half-Dozen, some called them behind their backs. It was apt for a couple of the members in his team, Harrington figured.

  Each man was dressed in head-to-toe black tactical gear. Their Kevlar vests and communications equipment and weapons were already stowed on the plane, a US Army Gulfstream V.

  A car rolled in. A single star. Brigadier General. Everyone just referred to her as The General. Some, far, far behind her back, called her Ice Queen.

  Harrington stood at attention and watched as the General’s lap-dog second lieutenant got out from behind the driver’s seat and went around and opened the door of the Army-spec town car. General Christie emerged and walked over to Harrington, looking the line of his team up and down.

  “We haven’t met,” General Christie said.

  “No, ma’am,” Harrington replied.

  Christie was silent, watching, appraising.

  “Have your men board the aircraft,” she ordered. “You and I need to talk.”

  14

  Walker turned the tablet off. He stared a moment at the black screen, imagining a time when the hyper-connected world could be dark for a month or so. He’d been through high school without much of the Internet, before it was the beast it was today. He’d survived. His parents hadn’t had it at all—his mother had emailed a couple of times in her life, maybe. To lose it now would be a big deal, no doubt, but the world would adapt—but not within a month of darkness. It would take time. But by then it would be up again. Unless the chaos created was such that others tried to use it as the means of a major terrorist attack. This was potentially so much easier than replicating a 9/11-type event. A geek or bunch of geeks with laptops and fast Internet connection could wreak havoc. What was the collective noun for a group of geeks—a quark? A basement?

  The Cuda’s engine thrummed. Walker worked the clutch, selected first and took off, the back tires spitting up loose chips of bitumen and stones and debris from the broken blacktop, then they grabbed purchase and flung him down the road. Soon he was in second, and then third, before he eased off and dropped into neutral to coast until he used the brakes to slow to a stop. He placed the iPad on top of a little VW Beetle, a copy of the original that continued to come out of a factory in Puebla until the early 2000s, then he sped off in a cloud of vapor and debris.

  Ahead was the drive to San Diego. He’d show his passport at the border, where they would see the Mexico entry stamp that David or the guys posing as TSA officers had put in there, along with a bogus letter from the Department of Homeland Security for expedited transit at the border crossing; he would cross and be at the Brokaws’ inside of an hour. Maybe the letter was genuine; his father still had reach, and friends, even if he was a ghost in the United States. Either way, Walker would soon be on target.

  Though what use Monica or her father could prove to be remained to be seen.

  Outside Rosarito, Walker let the car open up. The 1970 Hemi Cuda was one of the most sought-after of the small E-Body platform that Dodge stuffed their massive Hemi engine into. This was a ’71, Walker knew, because it was the very poster he’d had. What denoted it visually from other Hemi Cudas was the front grille, with four headlights rather than two, and a six-inlet design and fender grille louvers. Fewer than a thousand were built. He started to wonder how he could keep this. Where he’d keep it. He eased off the gas and coasted in neutral for a mile. The sound of the engine idling and the wind whipping in the open windows and the muted roar of warm tires on the highway. He dropped it into third and pressed the accelerator.

  With 390 brake horsepower and a 440 V8 engine, the Cuda could go from zero to sixty in 5.8 seconds and the quarter-mile in fourteen seconds at 102 miles per hour. He went into fourth gear. Walker felt that someone had tinkered with this big block. Feathered it. Bigger air intakes, richer fuel mix. He put the number closer to five flat. And then, in 1972, the Clean Air Act came in and the government and EPA kicked the muscle car in the arse with emissions regulations and ruined everybody’s fun. After that time, no more Hemi, no more big block models of any make could be ordered. Engines became smaller, more efficient.

  Progress.

  The car was headed north and the March sun was rising over his right shoulder. The highway between here and Tijuana was clear but for mid-sized trucks headed both ways.

  Walker thought of the last time he’d been in a version of this car. His high-school friend’s father had one in their garage. He spent a lifetime obsessively rebuilding it, driving it a little every other Sunday. Walker had learned via his mother that the friend had taken it out during college break and wrapped it around a tree. Walker had been in Colorado then, the Air Force Academy. His mother had called him with the news early one morning. Neither the friend nor the car survived the wreck. He had been Walker’s first close friend to die. In Iraq and Afghanistan, he lost dozens more.

  This car was a message, from his father. A token, an apology, making some tiny amends. Or . . . a warning? Watch where you’re going? Don’t be corrupted by the past? Did David even know of Chad’s death? Did his mother and father talk much then?

  Probably not. Not like that. But possibly . . . it was something that had involved him, and he’d been more than halfway across the country in his first year at the AFA. And his mother had told David about Monica, two years later.

  Walker dropped to third to overtake, then slotted fourth and settled in front of a three-truck convoy, the vehicles soon dots in his wake.
He was skirting around Tijuana. A place largely deserted by tourists now, because of the drug crime and other options that lured the American tourists and kids on spring break.

  Progress.

  Walker eased off the gas pedal as he noted his guard already lowering, with only a couple dozen miles behind him.

  Losing the Internet for a while before getting it back . . . what would happen to the reliance on the Net as a resource? Would local real-life networks become more vital again, be appreciated, take up some slack? Would older technologies like analogue radio regain popularity? Snail mail?

  Walker flicked on the radio, turning the dial to tune in to English-language news. They were replaying Jasper’s message while talking heads chimed in with opinions. Walker’s hands on the Cuda’s wheel. The border crossing loomed ahead. This side was choked up, all four lanes. Coming in was far easier, a small stream of trucks and a few motorhomes. A good hour’s wait, maybe two, without that piece of paper. Walker headed for the official’s booth, wound down the window, passed his ID and paper over. The guard took them, while two others went about searching the car. A cursory examination, the papers passed over, the boom gate lifted, and he was on his way.

  The gas tank had been full and was now at three-quarters. He hit the accelerator and headed north.

  •

  Harrington looked to his right, to his senior non-com, a guy named Hank, and that’s all that needed to happen. All five soldiers moved in formation and climbed the steps of the aircraft and disappeared inside, one having to go in sideways for the width of his shoulders.

  “How long have you been stationed here in Fort Meade?”

  “Two months, ma’am.”

  “Where were you before this?”

  “Alpha Company, third battalion, 1st Special Forces Group, ma’am.”

  “And your team?”

  “They’re pulled from all over, ma’am.”

  “They’re capable?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Look at me, Captain Harrington,” General Christie said.

  Harrington took the command and stood at ease and met the General’s eye.

  “You’ve seen the news this morning.” It wasn’t a question.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “The lead agencies on the case are currently the FBI and Homeland Security, because the FBI trumped other federal agencies with regard to hostage situations, and, well, Homeland is Homeland. And the NSA can’t be seen to be investigating one of their own where there were so many unknowns at play. But I expect all this to change as the day wears on.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “If I had it my way, I’d have the President do what Lincoln did and suspend Habeas Corpus and declare martial law throughout the country until the threat to the union abated.” General Christie watched Harrington’s reaction. He was stoic. “What do you think of that?”

  “I follow orders, ma’am.”

  “Good. That’s good. You’ve watched it all? The news?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “And?”

  “And it seems a legit threat against the nation, ma’am.”

  “You’ve researched the guy they have?”

  “Yes, ma’am. And we were briefed just before your arrival.”

  “Then you know what he’s capable of.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “What are we going to do about it?”

  “What is it you want me to do, ma’am?”

  “Make this go away. At any cost.”

  Harrington hesitated, but only for a beat. “You’re activating us to operate on US soil, ma’am?”

  “I just got off the phone to the National Security Adviser to the President. I’m headed to the White House now. This is being seen as the largest cyber threat our nation has faced. We have to beat this thing before it becomes all that it can be. Therefore, you have been activated.”

  “I need to have it in writing,” Harrington said. “Ma’am.”

  “Sorry?”

  Harrington looked forward, at attention. “I need you to authorize the use of deadly force on US soil, against US citizens. Just like my unit did when we operated in Katrina.”

  “Go read the Patriot Act, Harrington.”

  “I have, ma’am. And, all the respect in the world, but you know who this team is, and why we’re here. One more slip-up from any of us means Leavenworth at best, ma’am. I’d feel more comfortable with an order on this in writing.”

  “Or, how about you just do your job and follow an order, or I find another team who can.”

  “My team’s ready to rock. I just need to give them the go order. In writing. Please. Ma’am.”

  A pause.

  “My secretary will have it to you while you’re in the air.”

  “Thank you, ma’am.” Harrington paused, then said, “Can you tell us our objective, ma’am?”

  “This is a clean-up operation,” General Christie said. “Starting with Jasper Brokaw’s sister. Find her, detain her, await further orders.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  15

  Walker pulled up to the police cruiser. He could see another at the end of the street. A pair of San Diego’s finest on station in each. He was glad to see them there, because it meant that the government was taking this seriously, and that the Brokaws would be safe should anyone or anything threaten them. For the first time Walker realized that they may be being protected from the general populace. Jasper’s name was out there, and surely by now some news outlets were reporting that his father was a high-ranking general in the US Air Force, and pundits would be saying, How did this happen? and Maybe the father knows something, and Why don’t we go talk to the old guy and see what’s what. Walker had been around long enough to know that crazy people did crazy things, and there was no shortage of crazy when things started to fall apart.

  It was like what he saw so many times in Afghanistan, in the big villages. Where the locals, initially a mix of the jubilant and those skeptical of the soldiers who had booted out the Taliban, soon lashed out at anything in a uniform when things went wrong. The United States, NATO, the coalition forces, the Afghan Army—it didn’t matter. It’s not that the Afghanis wanted the Taliban back, it’s that they were frustrated and desperate and angry, and anyone in a uniform became a symbol of their problems. The small villages were a different story, as the power vacuum invited local warlords, many of them ex-Taliban, to fill the security role. And around and around it went.

  Walker showed the local police his Homeland Security letter and his ID, and was directed to park his car halfway down the street—in case it contained explosives, Walker figured. One SDPD officer followed him on foot, then patted him down and checked the vehicle over in a cursory search. He motioned onward and ghosted Walker shoulder to shoulder to the house, the whole time keeping a hand on his side-arm and the other on his radio, into which he spoke quietly and listened intently.

  The General’s house was storybook Spanish Colonial. The American flag was on one post, the clasp holding it at sixty degrees; the blue Air Force flag on the other, with its coat of arms, thirteen white stars representing the original thirteen colonies, and the Air Force Seal.

  The door opened as Walker’s foot touched the first hardwood step leading up to the porch.

  An FBI agent in a suit, jacket open, badge ID on his belt to the side, service automatic next to that, nodded to the cop, who took his leave.

  “You here to talk to the General?” the agent asked.

  “Yep,” Walker said.

  The agent looked him up and down.

  “ID?”

  “I already showed the cop.”

  “I’m not that cop or any other cop.”

  “That makes two of us.”

  The FBI man smiled and put his hands on his hips, signaling that their little dalliance was over as it began. “And where’d they say you were from, exactly?”

  “The General knows me,” Walker said. “We go way back.” He gave
the agent a stare that he used to use for junior soldiers and recruits who needed to learn a lesson in obeying the chain of command, and flashed the piece of Homeland Security paper. He’d learned through a life in the military and intelligence worlds that being direct to those subordinate usually expedited things. He was slowly adapting to a life on the outer where his status was not immediately apparent.

  “Right,” the FBI guy said, handing the paper back, having thoroughly read it over. “This way.”

  The agent paced down a wide, open hallway. There was a cloakroom and a hat stand and a wall of family photos: the General, his wife, Monica and Jasper, all on holidays, the General never in uniform. Walker figured that there would be a study, perhaps upstairs in a spare bedroom, that contained all of the General’s uniform photos. His “Me Wall,” they called it. Pictures of the General at various stages of his career, mostly those when he held command posts or was posing with heads of state and Capitol leadership.

  The hallway opened up to a bright kitchen at the back of the house, where another FBI agent stood by an island bench, a stool showing where he’d been seated before Walker’s arrival. But Walker and his guide didn’t enter the kitchen, instead they had stopped seven paces down the hall at an open doorway to the right, where Walker saw two overstuffed couches, a couple of armchairs and a large television next to a gas fireplace. News was on the television; Jasper’s picture was in the bottom corner.

  Walker saw the General, but no Monica.

  “Sir,” the FBI agent said to General Brokaw. “This man, a Mr. Walker, to see you.”

  “Can you leave us a moment?” Walker asked the agent.

  The agent looked to General Brokaw, who didn’t respond.

  “Integrity First, sir,” Walker said to General Brokaw. “Service Before Self, and Excellence in All We Do.”

  The General’s eyes softened a little, then he looked to the agent and motioned him away.