“Yeah, wear a black suit. I assume that’s what you have in those garment bags.”
Both men nodded.
“Good.” Culder slid a picture of the target out of a folder and placed it on the table. “Now burn this man into your memory. Losing him isn’t an option.”
Chapter 98
Both men were focused. Trent Turner had been busy showing the hacker how to use the equipment he brought with him from his townhome. The operative was impressed with Etzy Millar’s ability to operate the gear. He had picked it up much quicker than expected. Millar attributed his fast progress to playing too many video games, a guilty pleasure he likely thought would never give him an advantage in real life.
Turner had scouted around the area for a secluded place to launch the PMD so Millar could practice. Chicago was much busier now than it had been in the morning, but it wasn’t long before he found a suitable location to launch the PMD and turn Millar loose. The hacker would be an extra set of eyes during Turner’s planned meeting with Heckler at the performance.
He was awestruck by the capabilities of the toy-like flying machine, and Turner could tell he was looking forward to the opportunity to be a part of the action.
Millar commanded the PMD to return to their location and said, “This thing is insane.”
“That’s one way to put it.” The operative laughed. “Tak is a genius. Wait until you meet him.”
“So you never told me?” he asked curiously.
Turner fixed a questioning glance on the hacker. “Told you what?”
“What it stood for. You know, PMD.”
Turner smiled. “That’s right. You have to promise you won’t lose respect for it if I tell you.”
“Aw, come on,” Millar implored.
“Promise.” His tone was insistent.
Millar nodded his head in surrender. “Okay, fine. I promise.”
Turner looked him square in the eye with a stone expression. “PMD stands for Poor Man’s Drone.” He sounded so serious it took Millar a couple seconds to process what he had said.
Millar burst into laughter. “Holy shit, that’s funny,” he blurted out as Turner cracked a smile.
“Chalk that one up to Tak,” Turner said. “Without a sense of humor, this job can become dismal.”
“I’ll bet. I can’t wait to meet him,” Millar responded. Then he went ominously quiet as the drone landed in front of them.
Trent sensed Millar was feeling the gravity of the situation. “Are you okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” he said unconvincingly.
“We’ll get through this, Etzy. You need to stay strong.” He walked over and started to disassemble the PMD and then looked to the hacker. “It’s the only way you’ll make it out the other side.”
“I know.”
They walked back to the hotel room in silent contemplation. As soon as Millar sat down in front of the desk, his computer screen lit up. It was an audio call from The Shop. Millar clicked on the button to answer.
“Hello, Etzy, it’s Cyndi.”
“Any more news?” he asked.
“Yes. Both good and bad.”
“Okay. Finger is here with me, so go ahead.”
“Good. We’ve managed to find what we think are the remnants of a bot at the Federal Reserve locations in New York and in DC.”
“Wow. What’s wrong?” Turner said, reacting to the concern evident in her voice.
“Well, the bot doesn’t appear to be on any of the systems. We got lucky in New York when we pulled traffic logs from an ISP they’re using. We were able to trace communication activity by correlating information with one of the bots Etzy’s module had propagated to.”
He sat down next to Millar. “So they uninstalled the bot?”
“That’s right, Finger,” she confirmed. “It’s no longer on the machine. Fortunately we were able to find backups of the systems in question close to the date indicated in the ISP’s traffic log. We’re trying to download the computer’s image without the Fed picking up the traffic.”
“How long until you’ll have it downloaded?”
“An hour or two,” she said. “We don’t want to risk the Fed knowing we’re there. It could bring with it a whole new set of problems.”
“Better to be safe. There’s a lot at stake here,” Turner agreed. He considered the new information and realized they might have a problem. “Do you think they’re onto us?”
“No, no. This happened well before we even knew the botnet existed. The backup image might not have anything on it, since it’s a couple of days older than the time stamp for the traffic.” She sighed in frustration. “It’s a shot in the dark at this point, but we don’t have much else to go on where the Fed is concerned.”
“Have you been able to get Tak on this yet?” Turner asked, slightly annoyed.
“No,” Grayson said. She fumbled her next words. “There is a personal issue. He can’t be involved.”
“Personal?” Turner asked with the tone of a skeptic.
“Finger,” she said, obviously flustered, “I’ve probably said too much already. You know how it is. I’m not at liberty to say. I wish we could have him on this too.”
Turner looked to Millar and shook his head. “I get it,” he replied. “Thanks.”
He knew the way it worked. He wasn’t going to get any more information out of her. There was an awkward moment of silence before the operative turned to Millar.
“The bot modified another system then?” Turner asked. “Or maybe the Fed discovered their presence, and they bailed.”
“It could be something destructive,” Millar suggested. “Maybe there’s some sort of code set to run on a certain date or trigger to wipe their systems out.”
“You said it was sophisticated,” Grayson said to Millar. “That’s not a very sophisticated attack.”
“Sure, but the Federal Reserve is the central bank. I’m a step ahead of you. If the plan is to target banks that are connected to it, maybe they’re trying to bring the systems down after they do whatever they’re going to do, so things can’t be verified.” He looked to Turner.
“Interesting thought,” Turner agreed. “That’s a good point.”
“I’m not sure how the financial system works,” Millar said, “but if you’re going to take down something that massive, you’ll need to coordinate and make sure you cut off all of its heads at once.”
“I hadn’t considered that,” Grayson admitted. “You could be onto something, Etzy. We have two CEOs involved from large banks that use the DataBank software. They’ve been kind enough to direct their technology staff to work with us on this.”
“That’s good news,” Turner said.
“Well, they’ve been a bit slow, unfortunately.” Grayson was clearly frustrated. “I can understand their reluctance to break policy, but we can’t give them as much information as we’d like to, since this is classified. It’s also slower, since we’re only using communication channels that aren’t connected to the bank, just in case.”
There was still an area that bothered Tuner. “What about the deaths overseas?”
“We’re still working on that but have made some progress.”
“Have you gotten into the Fed’s accounting systems to see who they bank with internationally?”
“Yes,” Grayson confirmed. “They have sizable balances at several institutions. Most correlate with the murdered hackers that belonged to The Collective. We have a team of analysts digging through all of the connections.”
Turner’s brow creased with concern. “What sort of balances are we talking about?”
“Trillions. They have vast amounts of money parked overseas. There’s also continual movement. We’re talking huge transfers, so we definitely can’t rule that out.”