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

a couple of chairs and a file cabinet.

Charlie turned his back on Templer and sighed. “I’m sorry,

Marty. It’s not you.” He paced to the other side of the small

confining room. “I’m getting pressure from all sides. That

damned FBI guy is making a nuisance of himself. Asking too many

questions. The media smells a conspiracy and the Director is

telling me to ignore it.” Sorenson stood in front of Templer.

“And, now, no, it’s not bad enough, but 8 more of the mothers go

off. Shit!” He slammed his fist onto the desk.

“We can explain one to the Pentagon, but nine?” Martin asked

skeptically.

“See what I mean?” Sorenson pointed.

Sorenson and Templer attended the ECCO and CERT roundups twice a

week since they began after the first EMP-T explosion.

“These are the Sats?” Templer leaned over to the desk. Corners

of several high resolution satellite photographs sneaked out from

a partially open folder. Sorenson opened the folder and spread

the photos across the surface. They weren’t optical photographs,

but the familiar map shapes of the central United States were

visible behind swirls and patterns of a spectrum of colors. The

cameras and computer had been instructed to look at selected

bandwidths, just as infrared vision lets one see at night. In

this case, though, the filters excluded everything but frequen-

cies of the electromagentic spectrum of interest.

“Yeah,” Sorenson said, pointing at one of the photos. “This is

where we found the first one.” On one of the photos, where an

outline of the United States was visible, a dot of fuzzy light

was visible in the Memphis, Tennessee area.

“That’s an EMP-T bomb?” asked Templer.

“The electromagnetic signature, in certain bandwidths is the same

as from a nuclear detonation.” Sorenson pulled another photo

out. It was a computer enhanced blowup of the first satellite

photo. The bridges across the Mississippi were clearly visible.

The small fuzzy dot from the other photograph became a larger

fuzzy cloud of white light.

“I didn’t know we had geosyncs over us, too,” Templer said light-

ly.

“Officially we don’t,” Sorenson said seriously. Then he showed

his teeth and said, “unofficially we have them everywhere.”

“So who was hit?”

“Here?” He pointed at Memphis. “Federal Express. A few hours

ago. They’re down. Can’t say when they’ll be back in business.

Thank God no one was killed. They weren’t so lucky in Texas.”

Sorenson pulled a couple more photographs and a fuzzy dot and

it’s fuzzy cloud mate were clearly visible in the Houston area.

“EDS Computers,” said Sorenson. “Six dead, 15 injured. They do

central processing for hundreds of companies. Every one, gone.

And then here.” He scattered more photos with the now recogniz-

able fuzzy white dots.

“Mid-State Farm Insurance, Immigration and Naturalization, Na-

tional Bank, General Inter-Dynamics, CitiBank, and the Sears mail

order computers.” Sorenson spoke excitedly as he listed the

latest victims of the magnetic cardiac arrest that their computer

systems, and indeed, their entire organization suffered.

“Press?”

“Like stink on shit.”

“What do they know?”

“Too much.”

“What can we do?”

“Get to the bottom of this before Mason does.”

Chapter 19 Thursday, January 7 Amsterdam, Holland

The following morning Scott awoke without telephone intervention

by the front desk. He felt a little on the slow side, an observa-

tion he attributed to either the time difference, not the jet

lag, or the minor after effect of copius cannabis consumption.

The concierge called a cab and Scott told the driver where he

thought he was going. Ya, no problem, it’s a short ride.

To Scott’s surprise he found himself passing by the same sex

emporium where he had left the Spook last evening. Scott reminded

himself to ask Spook how it went. The taxi stopped in front of

an old building that had no signs of use. It was number 44, but

just in case, Scott asked the driver to wait a moment. He walked

up the door and finding no bell, rapped on the heavy wooden door.

“Ya?” A muffled voice asked through the door.

“Is Jon there? This is Scott Mason.” Scott knowingly looked at

the cab driver.

“Who?”

Scott looked at the number again and then remembered what Jon had

told him. “Sorry. This is Repo Man. Kirk said you’d expect

me.”

“Ah, ya! Repo Man.” The door opened and Scott happily waved off

the cab. “Welcome, please, come in.” Scott entered a dark

chamber as the door closed behind him. “I am Clay, that’s French

for key.”

Wonderful, thought Scott. “Thanks for the invite. Is Jon here?”

“Everyone is here.”

“I thought it didn’t begin until eleven,” Scott said looking at

his watch.

“Ah, ya, well,” the Dutch accented Clay said. “It is difficult

to stop sometimes. We have been here all night.”

Scott followed Clay up a darkened flight of steps. At mid land-

ing Clay opened a door and suddenly the dungeon-like atmosphere

vanished. Inside the cavernous room were perhaps 200 people,

mostly men, excitedly conversing and huddling over computers of

every imaginable model. The high ceiling was liberally dressed

with fluorescent tubing which accentuated the green hues from

many of the computer monitors. The walls were raw brick and the

sparse decorations were all computer related. Windows at the two

ends of the building added enough daylight to take some of the

edge off of the pallid green aura.

“What should I do?” Asked Scott looking around the large room

which was probably overcrowded by modern safety counts.

“The Flying Dutchman said he will see you a little later,” Clay

said. “Many of our members know Repo Man is a reporter, and you

are free to look and ask anything. Please enjoy yourself.” Clay

quickly disappeared into the congregation.

Scott suddenly felt abandoned and wished he could disappear.

Like those dreams where you find yourself stark naked in a public

place. He felt that his computer naivete was written all over

his face and he would be judged thus, so instead he tried to

ignore it by perusing the walls. He became amused at the selec-

tion of art, poster art, Scotch taped to the brick.

The first poster had Daffy Duck, or reasonable facsimile thereof,

prepared to bring a high speed sledgehammer in contact with a

keyboard. “Hit any key to continue,” was the simple poster’s

message. Another portrayed a cobweb covered skeleton sitting

behind a computer terminal with a repairman standing over him

asking a pertinent question. “System been down long?”

One of the ruder posters consisted of Ronald Reagan with a super-

imposed hand making a most obscene manual gesture. The poster was

entitled, “Compute This!”

Scott viewed the walls as if in an art gallery, not a hackers

convention. He openly laughed when he saw a poster from the

National Computer Security Center, a working division of the

National Security Agency. A red, white and blue Uncle Sam,

finger pointing, beckoned, “We want YOU! to secure your

computer.” In an open white space on the poster someone wrote

in, “Please list name and date if you have already cracked into

an NSA computer.” Beneath were a long list of Hacker Handles

with the dates they had entered the super secret agency’s comput-

ers. Were things really that bad, Scott asked himself.

“Repo Man?”

Scott turned quickly to see a large, barrel chested, red haired

man with an untamed beard in his early forties approach him

rapidly. The man was determined in his gait. Scott answered,

“Yes . . .?

“Ya, I’m the Flying Dutchman,” he said hurriedly in a large boom-

ing voice. “Welcome.” He vigorously shook Scott’s hand with a

wide smile hidden behind the bushy red face. “You enjoyed Am-

sterdam last night, ya?” He expected a positive answer. Sex was

no crime here.

“Well,” Scott blushed. “I must say it was a unique experience,”

he said carefully so as not to offend Holland’s proud hosts.

“But I think the Spook had more fun than I did.”

The Flying Dutchman’s hand went limp. “Spook? Did you say

Spook?” His astonishment was clear.

“Yeah, why?” Scott asked.

“The Spook? Here? No one has seen him in years.”

“Yeah, well he’s alive and well and screwing his brains out with

three of Amsterdam’s finest,” Scott said with amusement. “What’s

the big deal?”

“The Spook, ya this is goot,” the Flying Dutchman said clapping

his hands together with approval. “He was the greatest phreak

of his day. He retired years ago, and has only been seen once or

two times maybe. He is a legend.”

“A phreak?”

“Oh, ya, ya. A phreak,” he said speaking rapidly. “Before home

computers, in the 1960’s and 1970’s, hacking meant fighting the

phone company. In America you call it Ma Bell, I believe. Cap-

tain Crunch was the epitome of phone phreaks.”