Terminal Compromise - Winn Schwartau (fiction book recommendations TXT) 📗

class="calibre1">Every traffic light in Manhattan was green according to the

police. Jim reported the apparent problem on the air and as many

accidents as he could; there were too many accidents to name. He

passed on the recommendations of the police: Best Stay Home.

By 6:30 two additional helicopters were ordered to monitor the

impending crisis as the city approached real gridlock. Police

helicopters darted about while the media listened in on the

conversations from their police band radios.

At 7:00 the Traffic Commissioner was called at home, and told

that he shouldn’t bother trying to come to work. The streets

were at a standstill. Thousands of extra police units were

dispersed throughout the city in a dubious attempt to begin the

process of managing the snarl that engulfed the city.

Scott Mason exited from the 43rd. Street and Vanderbilt side of

Grand Central Station and was met with a common sight – a massive

traffic jam. He walked the one block to Fifth Avenue and it

gradually dawned on him that traffic wasn’t moving at all. At

8:15 A.M. it shouldn’t be that bad. The intersection at Fifth

was crowded with cars aiming in every direction and pedestrians

nervously slipped in and around the chaos.

Scott walked the three blocks to the Times digesting the effects

of the city’s worst nightmare; the paralysis of the traffic

system. At that thought his stomach felt like he had been thrown

from an airplane. The traffic computers.

* Washington, D.C.

Sonja Lindstrom watched the New York based Today show from the

kitchen counter in her upscale Reston, Virginia townhouse. What

a mess, she thought. She knew how bad traffic could be in New

York even when the lights worked. A news flash pre-empted an

interview with Joan Embry from the San Diego Zoo. Sonja watched

intently. New York was entering panic mode, and the repercus-

sions would be world wide. Especially with the banks closed.

The New York radio stations linked up with the Emergency Broad-

cast System so they could communicate with the half million

drivers who had nowhere to go. Bridges and tunnels into Manhat-

tan were closed and cars and busses on major arteries were being

forced to exit onto side streets. Schools, shops and non-essen-

tial government services were shut down for the day.

The Governor of New York declared a state of emergency and the

National Guard was called to assist the local police. Sonja

compared New Yorkers’ reactions to this crisis to the way they

deal with a heavy snowfall when the city stops. Pretty much like

any other day. No big deal, go to a bar, good excuse for a

party. She giggled to herself as the phone rang.

“Hello?”

“Good morning, Sonja?”

“Oh, hi, Stephanie. Yeah. Kind of early for you, isn’t it?”

Sonja sipped her coffee.

“It is, I know, but I had to call you,” Stephanie said quickly.

“Something wrong?” Sonja asked.

“I think so, maybe. Wrong enough that I had to tell you.”

Stephanie sighed audibly. “You don’t have to play up to Scott

Mason any more. I’m getting out.”

“Out of what?” Sonja said with confusion.

“I’ve learned a few things that I don’t like, and I’ve kinda got

hung up on Miles, and, well, I feel funny about taking the money

anymore. Especially since Miles doesn’t know about the arrange-

ments. You know what I mean?”

“Yes. With Scott it bothered me a little. So I made believe I

was on the Dating Game. All expense paid date.” Sonja knew

exactly what Stephanie meant. Deep inside she had known that at

one point or another she would have to meet the conflict between

her profession and her feelings straight on and deal with it.

She had not suspected that it would be for passion, nor because

of one of her ‘dates’.

“Besides,” Sonja added, “I didn’t need to push him into anything.

He’s so hung on this story that it’s almost an obsession with

him.”

“That’s good to know, I guess,” Stephanie said vacantly until her

thoughts took form. “Hey, I have an idea. Why don’t the four

of us get together sometime. I’m sure the boys have a lot in

common.”

“Scott should be down tonight.”

“That should be fine. We were going to dinner anyway. Maybe we

can put this behind us.”

* New York City

The traffic engineers frantically searched for the reason that

the signals had all turned green. They reinitialized the switch-

es and momentarily thousands of green lights flashed red and

yellow, but there was no relief from the gridlock. Computer

technicians rapidly determined that the processor control code

was ‘glitching’, as they so eloquently described the current

disaster. A global error, they admitted, but correctable, in

time. The engineers isolated the switching zones and began

manually loading the software that controlled each region’s

switches in the hope of piecing together the grid.

At noon the engineers and technicians had tied together the

dozens of local switches into the network and watched as they

synchronized with each other. The computers compare the date,

the time, anticipated traffic flow, weather conditions and adjust

the light patterns and sequences accordingly. Twenty minutes

later, just as system wide synchronization was achieved, every

light turned green again. It was then that the engineers knew

that it was only the primary sync-control program which was

corrupted.

The Mayor publicly commended the Traffic Commissioner for getting

the entire traffic light system back in operation by 2:00 P.M..

The official explanation was a massive computer failure, which

was partially true. Privately, though, Gracie Mansion instructed

the police to find out who was responsible for the dangerous

software and they in turn called the Secret Service. The media

congratulated the NYPD, and the population of the City in coping

with the crisis. To everyone’s relief there were no deaths from

the endless stream of traffic accidents, but almost a hundred

were injured seriously enough to be taken to the hospital.

Whoever was responsible would be charged with attempted murder

among other assorted crimes. All they had to do was find him.

* New York City

Telephoning to another day is about as close to time travel as we

will see for a century, but that’s how Scott felt when he called

OSO Industries in Tokyo. Was he calling 17 hours into the next

day, or was he 7 hours and one day behind? All he knew was that

he needed an international clock to figure out when to call Japan

during their business hours. Once he was connected to the OSO

switchboard, he had to pass scrutiny by three different opera-

tors, one of them male, and suffer their terrible indignities to

the English language. He told Homosoto’s secretary, whose Eng-

lish was acceptable, that he was doing a story on dGraph and

needed a few quotes. It must have been slow in Tokyo as he was

patched through almost immediately.

“Yes?”

“Mr. Homosoto?”

“Yes.”

“This is Scott Mason, from the New York City Times. I am calling

from New York. How are you today?”

“Fine, Mr. Mason. How may I help you?” Homosoto was obviously

the gratuitous sort when it came to the press.

“We are preparing to run a story in which Pierre Troubleaux

accuses you of murdering his partner Max Jones. He also says

that dGraph software is infected with destructive programs.

Would you like to comment, sir?” Scott asked as innocently as

possible under the circumstances.

No answer.

“Sir? Mr. Homosoto?”

“Yes?”

“We are also interested in your relationship with Miles Foster.

Mr. Homosoto?”

“I have nothing to say.”

“Are you financing hackers and Arabs to distribute computer

viruses?”

No answer.

“Sir, do you know anything about a blackmail operation in the

United States?”

“I should have killed him.”

“What?” Scott strained his ear.

“Mr. Troubleaux is alive?”

“I can’t answer that. Do you have any comment, sir? On

anything?”

“I have nothing to say. Good day.” The phone went dead.

Guilty as sin. A non-denial denial.

Chapter 25 Saturday, January 16 Tokyo, Japan

Dressed as business-like on the weekend as during the week, Taki

Homosoto sat at his regal techno-throne overlooking the Tokyo

skyline from his 66th floor vista. It was time. Years of prepa-

ration and millions of dollars later, it was time. Perhaps a

little earlier than he would have liked, but the result would be

the same anyway.

The first call Homosoto made was to Ahmed Shah in his