"That's what I thought. But I saw a kobun from the biggest Yakuza organization in Japan tonight. I know because I had a little tango with their godfather a few years back. Anyway, what's one of his street men doing here, shooting at Eva and me?" He paused as the implications of the night began to sink in. "This scene could start to get rough."
"You did nothing more than anybody here would have done." He looked pensive in the dim light. "Years ago, when the colonels and their junta seized Greece, I once had to—" He hesitated. "Sometimes we do things we don't like to talk about afterwards. But you always remember the eyes of a man you must kill. You dream about them."
"Our party lighting was pretty minimal. It was too dark to make out his eyes."
"Then you are luckier than you know." He glanced away. "This was not somebody you knew from another job, Michael? Perhaps the mercenary group you sometimes—"
"Never saw the guy before in my life, swear to God. Anyway, I think it was Eva he really wanted. But whatever's going on, I have to get her out of Crete now, before whoever it is finds her again."
"I agree." He was turning toward the living quarters in the rear. "You should stay here tonight, and then tomorrow we can get you both passage on the car ferry to Athens, off the island. I will take care of everything. Tickets, all of it." He returned carrying two tumblers of raki. After setting them on the table, he continued. "I am very worried for her, Michael. And for you. We all make enemies, but—" He took a sip from his glass. "By the way, do you have a pistol?"
"Not with me." He reached for the glass, wishing it was tequila — straight, with a twist of lime — and he was back on the Ulysses, trimming the genoa. "That's a mistake I may not make again soon."
"Then I will arrange for one. Like I said, everything. I have many friends. Do not worry." He drank again. "By the way, she asked me go to the hotel and get something for you. She seemed to think it was important. One of your modern American inventions. She had it locked in the safe at the desk. And she gave me money to pay for her room." He sighed. "Why would she waste money on a hotel when she could have stayed here with us?"
"What is it?"
"I think it's a computer, though it's barely the size of a briefcase. Part of the new age that mercifully has passed us by. I have it in back, with the rest of her things." His voice disappeared into the darkened kitchen. Moments later he reappeared carrying Eva's laptop. With a worried look he settled it gingerly on the table. "Do you have any idea why she had this with her?"
"I think she may have something stored in here." He settled it on the table and flipped up the top. Then he felt along the side for the switch, and a second later the screen glowed blue. After the operating system was in place, he punched up the files.
A long line of names filled the screen, arranged alphabetically. But nothing seemed right. It was a stream of unclassified NSA memos, and then a lot of personal letters. He resisted the temptation to call them up and delve into her private life. How many men…?
Stick to business. Save the fun for later. Where's the file?
Then he noticed the very first alphanumeric.
"Ackerman."
Hold on, he thought, wasn't that the name of the NSA guy she said gave her the disk? He highlighted the file on the screen and hit Retrieve. An instant later it appeared.
Yep, this one had to be it. Clearly an NSA document, very carefully stored.
(NSCID No. 37896) Page 1 of 28
Dept: Rl/SIGINT
Classification: TOP SECRET
Authorization: Dept/H/O/D only
Analyst: Eva Borodin
Init: EKB
Encryption: PES/UNKNOWN Reference: Classified
DAEDALUS PROTOCOL
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and Mino Industries Group, hereinafter referred to as the Parties;
MINDFUL of their obligation to strive for technological progress in both nations, CONVINCED that the technical and financial agreements specified in this Protocol will serve the long-range strategic interests of both Parties, CONSCIOUS that the success of Project Daedalus will lead to increased cooperation and mutual understanding between the peoples of the USSR and Japan, HAVE HEREBY AGREED AS FOLLOWS:
Article I
4659830481867394210786980498673261559798093 0291870980798578367251426478966596983748586 7030945896970980549381738405401290487571092 3836142543495019294766477810298378578576924 8598504821273850956070971070901613386089274 765608021834860…
That was it. The stream of numbers filled three pages, and then came Article II. Thus it went, for ten articles. As he scrolled up page after page, he realized that the numbers continued for the rest of the document.
She was right. Outside of occasional repetitions, there seemed to be no real pattern. He'd seen a lot of encryptions in the old days, but this one didn't look like anything standard.
He sat staring at the screen. Mino Industries Group. That explained the Mino-gumi goon. The godfather was planning his biggest play yet, global.
But what was it? What was in the deal? This was something he had to see.
Eva had said she tried the Data Encryption Standard, the DES system, and got nowhere. Which meant NSA had been foiled. How had he done it?
DES was a procedure whereby data were passed through a series of eight S-boxes, actually mathematical operations, that when combined with a unique user key converted it into what appeared to be alphanumeric garbage. The receiver also had a copy of the key, which could be used in combination with the same set of mathematical operations to convert it back.
He knew that back when DES was being invented by IBM, the National Security Agency had purposely sabotaged Big Blue's original plan to make it uncrackable. NSA had insisted that the key, a string of zeroes and ones, be limited to 56 bits, rather than the proposed 128 bits, which would have made the system so complex it would have been safe forever. The reason, of course, was that NSA didn't want an unbreakable cipher loose on the planet; after all, their primary business was reading other people's mail. IBM didn't know it at the time, but the smaller key was already a pushover for NSA's Cray supercomputers, which could try a trillion random keys per second and routinely crack any 56-bit DES encryption in the world in half a day.
Anybody familiar with the intelligence business was well aware of that. Which was, obviously, why somebody had turned to NSA.
But Eva said she'd tried the usual random-key procedure and got nowhere. So what was the answer?
His head was buzzing from the raki now, but he kept turning over in his mind the possibility that she'd been looking in the wrong place. Trying to find the DES key when in fact this encryption used some entirely different scheme.
He rubbed at his temples and tried to run the scenario backward.
Project Daedalus. The more he thought about it, the more…
"Zeno." He looked up from the screen. "Do you still have that copy of Realm of the Spirit?" He'd sent the old Greek an autographed first edition the week it came out.
"Your book, Michael? Of course I have it. I treasure it. It's in the bedroom, in back."
"Mind getting it for me? I feel like a little light reading."
"At four in the morning? Michael, I think—"
"You know how it is when your mind gets filled up with garbage at bedtime."
"You should be getting some sleep, like Eva. Tomorrow we have to—"