“Where’s the hard drive?” Marcus asked.
Rahim cut his eyes to Marcus without turning his head. “Do you think we were going to let you walk out of here with a hard drive containing our nuclear operating system on it?”
“We agreed that I would—”
“We agreed on the terms, Mr. Marcus. We never said how you would conduct the job.” He gestured to the adjacent room. “We have computers set up in there and a secure satellite link on the rooftop connected to Iran and the motherboard.”
Rahim stepped to the door, opened it and motioned for them to follow him. A widescreen monitor was wired to three computer towers. Cables from a satellite dish snaked through the windowsill. He said, “There is your hard drive, Mr. Marcus. That one stays with us. Our team in Nantaz will monitor everything you do. How long will it take?”
Marcus stepped to the computer, opened the system and said, “That depends on how complex the worm is, and I won’t be able to tell until I look inside the grid and run some tests. Myrtus can operate only within the Windows platform. Your programmable logic controller won’t differ that much from any that Siemens or any vendor of nuclear centrifuges sells its product to. What will be different is the nearly indecipherable coding that manages it, especially as your system comes closer to going online. I’ll raise the hood and run a complex diagnostics. But I won’t do a damn thing until your president goes on international television and releases the first hostage.”
Rahim’s mouth turned down like a horseshoe between his nose and chin. He said, “Narsi, do you have the funnel?”
Narsi opened a drawer and held up a glass funnel, like something found in a high school chemistry lab. He lifted a glass bottle and held it so Marcus could see the labeclass="underline" sulfuric acid. Rahim smiled. “Mr. Marcus, I never cared for American metaphors — raise the hood. But since that is what you people comprehend the easiest, let me be clear. You will begin now or Narsi will shoot the woman through her right knee. If you corrupt or tamper with our system, beyond finding and destroying the worm, you will watch us pour sulfuric acid through that funnel and into her vagina and then over her breasts. She will beg us to kill her, which we will do…but very slowly.”
He turned to Alicia. “Miss Quincy, we will release the first infidel tomorrow. And it will not be your niece.”
SEVENTY-FIVE
After more than eight hours tracing codes on the Iranian system, Marcus felt the muscles between his shoulder blades tighten. As he worked, Narsi and Rahim came in and out of the room, speaking heated Farsi into satellite phones. Alicia sat on a cot near the wall behind Marcus and tried not to think of Brandi. She stepped over to Marcus and whispered. “I have a very low profile. I’m not on anyone’s grid. How’d they know I’m Brandi’s aunt?”
He leaned back in the wooden chair. “I don’t know.”
“How are you coming? Have you found something?”
“Yes, it’s in there. The worm’s ability to reprogram external program logic controllers could toss a wrench into it. I can see software that’s been installed to try to eradicate the worm, or worms. But I can’t tell if it’s been effective. The programmers could have built in a mechanism that will cause even more damage if someone attempts to remove it.”
“I wonder who is responsible for embedding it there.”
“Could be any contractor with a flash drive. It’s so sophisticated that whoever created it had help. It may have been Israel’s baby, but someone else probably fathered it.”
Rahim and Narsi entered the room. Rahim said, “Our chief prosecutor appeared on television one hour ago to announce the release of Adam Spencer.” He glanced at Alicia and added, “The fiancé of your niece.”
Alicia looked at Marcus and said nothing.
Rahim said, “Reporters were there and the BBC is filing its story now. We can watch the feed.” He pressed a hand-held remote control device and images filled a small plasma screen to the left of the computer screen. Iran’s chief prosecutor stood on the steps in front of the judicial building and spoke to reporters in Farsi. The news story cut to scenes of Adam Spencer as he was escorted from the front of Evin Prison and whisked away in a waiting car. The next video images showed Adam at the Tehran International Airport.
In English, the reporter said, “Chief prosecutor Oshnar Abbasi said an indictment has been handed down by Iran’s judiciary bringing charges against the two young Americans. However, he said the government decided to release Adam Spencer on humanitarian grounds. He added that Brandi Hirsh will be held and court proceedings are underway. If she is found guilty on charges of espionage, the verdict could lead to the death penalty. The two Americans were arrested in northern Iran when they allegedly walked across the Turkey — Iran border when they were picking berries. U.S. Secretary of State, Merriam Hanover, said efforts to free Brandi Hirsh will continue, and she is hopeful the twenty-two-year old woman, who is said to be diabetic, will be released soon. John Cunningham, BBC, Tehran.”
Rahim half smiled. “The girl will be released when your job is finished.”
“Who guarantees that? How do we know that?” asked Alicia, her voice now raspy.
“Because, when a Muslim man tells you something, when he offers his word, it is his bond. This is something almost unheard of in the West.” He looked at Marcus. “That is why the girl will not be released until we have been convinced, Mr. Marcus, that you have removed the worm and created software patches that prevent its return.”
“Look, I found evidence of an infiltration. I’ll track the worm to where it’s embedded, and then I will kill it. But, before I do that, I want you to promise me that Brandi will be released as soon as the Myrtus worm is destroyed.”
Rahim crossed his arms, looked at Narsi and said, “Get Jalil on the satellite phone.” Narsi nodded, left the room and began connecting the call. Rahim stared at Marcus and gestured to the computer screen. Then he turned on the camera above the screen. “Our engineers are watching you, Mr. Marcus. Show us where the invader lies in our system.”
Marcus could see an engineer’s image in the corner of the screen, knowing the high definition camera was beaming his face and voice to a secure room deep in one of Iran’s nuclear plants. He used the mouse to highlight lines of code. “This is the coding that works directly with the frequency converter drives that are part of the Siemens S7-300 system and the associated modules. It looks like the worm is designed to only attack those program logic controllers with the variable-frequency drives.”
“How does it do this?” a voice off screen asked from the computer speakers.
Marcus avoided looking directly in the camera. “I’ve been able to determine that it is specifically engineered to monitor the frequency of the centrifuge motors. It will only attack systems that operate, or spin, between eighty and twelve hundred hertz. I am writing a software patch that should diffuse the binary code, the file, and render it useless in its present state.”
In a thick Persian accent, another question came from the speakers, this time from the person in the corner of the screen. “We need you to send a copy of that patch to us. Can it be used to shield against future attacks?”