Clive cusslers dark vect.., p.15
Clive Cussler's Dark Vector, page 15
“What are you doing down here?” Sabrina asked.
The blond-haired man offered a befuddled look. “I, umm . . .”
As the man fumbled for an answer, recognition dawned on Pradi. “You called the ambulance,” he said. “You’re part of this.”
The blond man seemed saddened. “I really wish you hadn’t remembered that.”
He produced a small, almost toylike gun, aiming it at the CEO.
Sabrina took a step toward the door.
“Don’t,” the blond man ordered. “This may be a 3D-printed gun made here on-site, but the bullets are the store-bought, lethal variety.”
She stopped in her tracks.
Pradi found his temper rising. “How dare you,” he snapped. “How dare you betray us.”
The blond man responded by firing the gun twice, hitting Pradi in the chest both times. The CEO dropped in a heap.
Sabrina rushed forward. But it was a poor risk. The shooter fired again, hitting her in the stomach. She crumpled to the floor, landing awkwardly and clutching her midsection.
With both of them down, the blond man made his way to a workstation near the far wall. Using a quick release lever, he opened the computer tower and removed the hard drive. He placed it in a silvery static-free bag, which he sealed with two layers of tape.
“I’m fairly certain my friends didn’t get away,” he said to the dying CEO. “Too bad. But you know the first rule of computer school. Always back up your work.”
He held up the second hard drive, onto which he’d loaded the source code.
Pradi grasped the man’s ankle, but he shook loose and fired the last bullet from his small weapon into Pradi’s heart. The CEO went still.
With both the CEO and the security chief motionless on the floor, the blond man reached down and yanked their ID badges from around their necks. He stuffed them in his pocket before heading to the exit, calmly switching off the lights and stepping out the door.
He took the elevator up to the roof, where he sealed the hard drive in a second waterproof bag. This one black instead of silver.
He tossed it into the shallow rooftop pool and watched it float toward the waterfall near the front of the building. Dusk had come and gone. The black bag floating in the dark water would be invisible now.
With the package on its way, he pulled out the ID cards, snapped them in half and tossed them into the pool. They sank to the bottom and remained there.
With everything going to plan, the blond man went back into the building. Having already given his statement to the police, he was allowed to leave. He made his way out, submitting to a pat down and calmly allowing himself to be examined by both the metal detector and millimeter wave scanner.
Clearing the door, he went across the bridge and entered the parking lot, using the walkway that ran beside the canal. He soon reached the drain where the water was sucked back in and recycled through the system. The black bag was caught on the grate. Too large to fit between the gaps, it bobbed and turned in circles as the water swirled underneath.
With a quick swipe of the hand, he scooped it up, tucked it under his arm and continued toward his car.
Because he’d taken their ID tags, Sabrina Lang and Sunil Pradi wouldn’t be found for over two hours. By then, Pradi would be long dead, Lang in a coma and the blond man safely aboard a private jet, sipping champagne and bound for Hong Kong.
CHAPTER 25
TAIWAN R.O.C.
The bad news reached Kurt and Joe as the Sapphire docked in Taipei.
“Someone got the source code out of Hydro-Com,” Kurt said, reading the report. “The CEO was killed. Looks like an inside job.”
“What about Hiram and the Trouts?”
“They’re okay,” Kurt said. “They were out of the building chasing someone else when it happened.”
Joe nodded. “Things continue to get more dangerous. We’d better be ready for anything.”
Kurt considered that sound advice. He put the report away. “Hungry?”
“I could eat,” Joe said. “What do you have in mind?”
Kurt stood and grabbed a ball cap. “We have to link up with a CIA asset who’s going to help us. He’s suggested we meet at one of the night markets downtown. From what I remember, we’ll find some of the best food on the island down there.”
“Spicy food, clandestine meetings in dark, crowded streets,” Joe said. “You have my interest. Let’s go.”
Leaving Winterburn, Stratton and the other crew members on the Sapphire, Kurt and Joe made their way into the heart of Taipei, arriving in a bustling area filled with people, music and the aroma of various savory dishes being cooked up at dozens of small shops and kiosks.
Globe-shaped yellow lanterns hung above the crowded streets, while boutiques selling trendy clothes and near-perfect knockoffs advertised their wares with neon signs of red, purple and blue.
“Not bad,” Joe said, enjoying the buzz of activity. “A little bit of Times Square and Mardi Gras all wrapped up in one.”
“The night markets are a big draw here,” Kurt said. “This one attracts the most tourists, so we won’t stand out like a pair of sore thumbs.”
Despite Kurt’s promise of food, the first order of business was to meet up with their contact, a man by the name of Steven Wu. They found him standing in front of a store that sold Hublot watches and cotton candy, an odd product mix if ever there was one.
Greetings were made, passwords exchanged. Kurt asked the obvious question. “Can we talk here?”
“We should be okay,” Wu told them. “If we walk and talk, it’ll be far too chaotic for anyone to eavesdrop.”
“What if we walk and talk and graze?” Joe suggested.
“Sure,” Wu told him, “though I usually advise people not to come to the night markets hungry. You’ll end up trying a little bit of everything.”
“My plan exactly,” Joe said.
Kurt had spent several months in Taiwan during his time in the Navy and had been there many times during his years with NUMA. He found it to be one of the most vibrant places in the world. Filled with energy, as if everyone who lived there was racing to get ahead, rushing to live as much life as possible as fast as they could. With the ever-present specter of China marching in one day and shutting the party down, he couldn’t really blame them.
“What have you heard about this auction?” Kurt asked.
“Believe it or not,” Wu said, “it hasn’t been kept all that secret. In fact, you’ll probably end up seeing representatives from several governments bidding alongside the more nefarious factions. Not to mention the assistance of several less than scrupulous banks.”
“How’s a group like CIPHER pull that off?”
“False pretenses,” Wu said. “Officially, the auction covers the proposed sale of an African mining venture, which is to be transferred lock, stock and tailing-filled barrel.”
Neat trick, Kurt thought. “Is that going to make this easier or more difficult?”
“Both. It means more competition. But at least you won’t be in a dark room surrounded by thugs and dripping rainwater. You’ll be in the lap of luxury.”
“Really? Where?”
Wu turned. “Up there.”
He pointed back down the street toward Taipei 101, the tallest building in Taiwan and one of the tallest in all the world. It stood like a neon monolith against the black sky.
Kurt studied the tower and said to Joe, “Things are looking up.”
He turned back to Wu. “Tell us more about CIPHER. How did they get involved in this and what are we looking at in terms of security?”
“There’s not too much to tell,” Wu said. “They’re a new player in this environment and they’re different. Think of them as an amoeba, hackers without a firmly defined structure. More like a five-headed monster than a single entity.”
“How does that work?”
“There’s no real boss, just a decentralized group that votes on which schemes to attempt and which to reject. Aside from the funding, each of the five cells are compartmentalized and disconnected from the others. It’s made them hard to penetrate. But it’s also kept them relatively small, in the grand scheme of things.”
“Until now,” Joe pointed out.
“Until now,” Wu agreed.
“Any idea why they suddenly took on bigger game?”
Wu shrugged. “It’s a little hard to parse the tea leaves, but the intel suggests a turf war has blown up between one of CIPHER’s leaders, a man named Degra, and a group on the mainland run by a British expat named Emmerson.”
“We know about Emmerson,” Kurt said. “Seems like the wrong guy to mess with.”
“What can I tell you?” Wu said. “Ambition can’t be caged. Like fighters trying to step up a weight class.”
“Worse consequences than a knockout here,” Kurt suggested.
Wu nodded in agreement. “Degra seems to be aware of that. He’s been busy adding some muscle to the group, bringing in hired guns to beef up security. You’ll see plenty of them at the auction, which I don’t need to tell you adds another wild card to the deck. The guys they’ve brought on are from the street. Not exactly cool customers. If something goes off the rails, they’re more likely to shoot up a whole room than to pick and choose their targets carefully.”
Kurt filed this info away. All in all, he’d rather deal with trained professionals than wild-eyed gunmen. Their actions were easier to predict. “I’d say it’s a bad idea to get in the middle of something like this, but that’s what we’re just about to do.”
Joe scowled. “Remind me to update my life insurance.”
Kurt laughed, then turned back to Wu. “Will Degra be running the auction?”
“He will,” Wu said. “I’ve sent over a link with some photos. But you should be able to recognize him by the white streak in his black hair. If the plan is going to work, you’ll need to talk to him directly, get inside his head. Whatever you do, don’t try to shake his hand. He’s a notorious germophobe.”
“Good to know,” Kurt said. “Now, assuming I can get his attention, what’s the plan?”
Wu pulled out what looked like an old-fashioned flip phone but was actually a high-capacity portable drive. “To make those servers operate Degra needs the source code. This device contains a sample that his technicians can evaluate and verify. Give it to him, have him plug it in somewhere for them to study.”
Kurt glanced at the palm-sized device. “Let me guess—the source code isn’t the only thing on this drive.”
“Correct,” Wu said. “It also contains a program known as a tunneling worm. Think of it as a superadvanced Trojan horse or virus. While Degra’s people examine the code, the worm downloads itself onto their system and starts jumping from computer to computer in search of information about the servers, bank accounts or anything else we might use against him.”
“These guys are hackers,” Kurt said. “Don’t you think they might be on the lookout for something like that?”
“They’ll never find it,” Wu insisted. “No matter what they use to search, they won’t be able to pick it up.”
Kurt was not convinced.
“Trust me,” Wu said, “I have a master’s degree in programming and five years chasing hackers and I couldn’t find it with any of the tools at my disposal. I don’t know where it came from—aliens or some sixteen-year-old genius in Pasadena—but there aren’t ten people in the world who could spot it and none of them are members of CIPHER.”
True or false, that was all they were going to get out of Wu. Kurt put the device in his pocket and looked back at the towering building off in the distance. The sides of Taipei 101 were glowing pale blue while the spire at the top was lit up like a neon orange spike. The glow illuminated the low clouds and patchy fog drifting in from the sea.
Kurt turned back to Wu. “And if they’re smarter than you think they are or they already have the source code, then what?”
Wu looked grim. “There’s not much we can do to help you. There’s one way up to the top and two ways down. But if you can’t use the elevator, that first step is a doozy.”
CHAPTER 26
TAIPEI 101
Kurt and Joe arrived in the lobby of Taipei 101 around midnight. Entering by special invitation, they bypassed the mall on the lower levels and made their way to a bank of high-speed elevators.
They were met by a pair of security guards in uniform who worked for the building and a man wearing a shimmery olive-colored suit who was apparently CIPHER’s official security chief. A pair of equally well-dressed compatriots stood nearby.
This group checked their credentials and escorted them to one of the high-speed elevators, which Kurt and Joe entered alone. It rose quickly, picking up speed as it went.
“Must be the express,” Joe said. “My ears are popping.”
Kurt’s were as well. “Did you see if those guys were armed?”
“You mean the overdressed security team in silk suits?” Joe said. “Weapons bulging under every jacket.”
Kurt had thought as much, but Joe had the better view. “CIPHER obviously decided to secure the ground floor as well as the ballroom. Not sure if that’s a good sign or bad.”
After thirty seconds the car slowed, stopping smoothly without any noticeable bump. The doors opened to reveal a large foyer with a white marble floor and matching walls. Orchids in ceramic pots added a splash of color.
Kurt stepped out of the elevator. To the right, a pair of broad-shouldered men stood beside a rectangular table draped in red velvet cloth. A second layer of security. Less nattily dressed than the men downstairs. But just as well-armed.
Beyond stood a folding screen decorated with traditional Chinese artwork. And beyond that, delicate glass sculptures created by a renowned Taiwanese artist.
Before they could go any farther, Kurt and Joe were given electronic wristbands that had the smooth surface of a touch screen. “Enter the room, tap the wristband and your attendant will explain the rest.”
Kurt nodded and walked around the screen and entered the ballroom. Though he kept an expressionless face, he found the ballroom impressive. It took up most of the ninety-third floor, with views of the city through windows on three of the four sides. A small catering station blocked the view on the fourth.
A chandelier made of colored glass flowers hung over the center of the room. Other lights were barely lit, creating a soft violet glow. On the far side of the chandelier was a dance floor backed by a low stage. Instead of a band or DJ, the stage was occupied by several enormous video screens, each of them over a hundred inches across.
Images of oversize construction equipment played across the screens: backhoes, excavators, dump trucks that would make a city bus look like a child’s toy. These gave way to photos of rooms filled with gold bars and photos of smiling workers in hard hats and tattered clothes. Finally, a series of charts and graphs appeared, bragging about the yields from the various parts of the mine.
“These guys are playing the mining card all the way to the end,” Kurt noted.
Joe shrugged. “Maybe you buy the computers and they throw in the mine for free.”
“I wonder what NUMA would do with a gold mine?” Kurt asked wryly, before switching the subject. “Did you get a count?”
“Seventy or eighty,” Joe said, having scanned the people milling about and done his best to tally rapidly. “I’d say it’s split evenly between CIPHER’s people and the bidders. And that’s not counting the tuxedoed staff working the bars and carrying trays of champagne.”
Kurt grinned. “The most important people in the room.”
“And least likely to cause a problem,” Joe replied.
They walked toward one of the well-stocked bars. “Let’s meet up with our attendant.”
Kurt tapped the wristband’s curved screen. It lit up with a green glow. A reed-thin man appeared beside them seconds later. He spoke slightly accented English. “My name is Chen,” he said. “How can I be of service?”
Their cover was deliberately murky, but with enough digging it would reveal links to a California-based corporation that had been a bitter rival of Hydro-Com. Years of litigation told the story. Nasty press releases filled with sordid accusations added a dash of color. The lawsuit and the rivalry were legit. But if the plan was going to work, Degra and CIPHER needed to make the connection on their own.
“First things first,” Kurt said, “we’ll need something stronger than champagne.” He gazed over at the bottles lined up on the back side of the bar, looking for just the right beverage. “A bottle of the Speyside Sherry Cask Single Malt should do, for starters.”
Chen looked unnerved. “The whole bottle?”
“And whatever he wants,” Kurt said, pointing to Joe.
“Ice water,” Joe said. “Still, not sparkling.”
“Also,” Kurt added, “if you’d show us to our booth, we’d like to make our initial bid.”
Chen turned to the bartender, snapped his fingers and pointed to the bottle of 130 proof Speyside Single Malt. It was placed on a tray with two lead crystal tumblers and two carafes, one filled with water, the other with ice.
“Please follow me,” Chen said.
He led them across the room to a booth aligned with the windows on the north side of the building. Curved couches, privacy walls and gauzy indigo drapes hanging from the ceiling offered a sense of intimacy.
Kurt sat down on one side of the booth. Joe sat on the other. Chen placed the items from the tray between them. “Be advised, the first round of bidding will commence in ten minutes.”
Kurt nodded and Chen left.
“That’s a thousand-dollar bottle of whiskey,” Joe said.
