Moynihan slumped into her chair and watched the three men face off. She was breathing heavily and had been hurt, but not too badly. Soller nodded, and a sense of relief came over her. Now they just needed a little luck for the phone to find a signal.
“What the hell are you doing?” The American soldier yelled at the Russian. “Stay out of this room. Do you hear me?”
The Russian spat at the FBI woman and stomped out the door. The others followed.
Seconds later the heavyset man entered the room with his laptop and spoke with urgency to the man in the utility jacket. He was speaking in Russian, so Moynihan couldn’t understand what he was saying.
Chapter 137
The constant exchange of cover fire had helped them work their way through the building. They had no way of knowing how many men they were up against, but Jake Sanders understood he and Rudy Pagano were in serious trouble. The distinct streams of gunfire provided them all of the information needed to come to that conclusion. The force they were up against was much bigger than they had expected.
As they approached the end of a long hallway, gunfire erupted from the large room they were about to enter.
“Shit, this is getting messy,” Sanders said.
Pagano nodded as both men slapped fresh magazines into their weapons. The exchange of fire in front of them had died down. They heard Russians yelling on the other side of the room.
“What the hell is going on in there?” Sanders asked.
He watched Pagano crane his head around a piece of machinery to get a better look. The operative headed inside, and he quickly followed.
“It’s hard to see anything in here,” Pagano said. “It looks like a group of guys are in the middle of the room, and there are some on the other side dug in near that hallway on the left.” He had a puzzled look. “It sounds like the other guys are Russians too.”
Sanders turned toward the hallway they had just come from. He could hear the footfalls of men behind them as they got closer and said, “Great. This is gonna be messy.” He knew they wouldn’t last long if they were taking fire from two sides.
Pagano tapped him on the shoulder and said, “I’ll try to move in and get a closer look.”
Sanders nodded and shored up his position so he could keep their chasers at bay. His eyes darted from the hallway to Pagano as he inched forward using the industrial machinery for cover. He contemplated their situation and wasn’t sure if it was worse than being surrounded by the enemy. An unknown force had entered into the equation, and he knew they would soon be overrun from behind. The shouting between the Russians grew louder and more heated. It sounded like something was about to go down.
Chapter 138
When CWDG Director Cynthia Grayson spoke to the most powerful man in the free world, it typically meant there was some sort of crisis — and this was no exception. In fact, it had the potential to be the most significant cyber threat to the United States she had ever seen. She cleared her throat before pressing the button to place the call, and was immediately connected to the White House Situation Room.
“Yes, Cyndi,” President Vincent Cross answered.
“Mr. President,” Grayson started, “we’ve been able to confirm the presence of the bots in several financial institutions. The attack is widespread, but we don’t have all of the targets at this point in time. We’re also aware of something involving the Federal Reserve, but we have reason to believe it to be a different attack vector.”
“Addy and I are still waiting for news on the Chicago operation. What are our options at this point?” the president asked.
“We have two, maybe three that I can see,” she said. “The first would be to continue our investigation and wait until we’ve learned enough to take the necessary action to prevent whatever they’re planning from happening.”
“The risks? And please, you know I respect your candor.”
She smiled a half smile. “We don’t know how long it will take for us to be in a position to prevent the attack. It could be twenty minutes, twenty-four hours, or even six months from now.”
“I see,” he replied.
She knew he wasn’t happy, but she wasn’t there as a pastry chef meant to sugarcoat things.
“Sir, I wish I could give you a better answer, but it’s just not possible. We’ve made a significant amount of progress, but it’s like any major investigation. We have no shortage of skill, but we’ll need a bit of luck to uncover the clues that will help us to make sense of their operation.”
“Understood. What’s option two?”
Grayson took a deep breath. “Shut down all major US financial institutions until we get a better handle on what we’re dealing with.” She could sense the president cringe on the other end of the line.
He took a moment to consider the option. “For how long?”
“It could be a couple of days, maybe more while they rebuild infected systems, unless we get lucky.”
Closing down the country’s financial sector for any period of time would bring forth disastrous results in the current economic climate. The economy had slowly begun its recovery from the combined effects of the real-estate-market crash, Ponzi schemes, and interest rate scandals, but times were still tough for much of the country. Despite the progress that had been made in terms of the economy, it was still a patient that needed to be handled in intensive care. Any problem in the financial sector significant enough to raise a red flag would breed irreparable distrust, and turn the economy into a terminal patient.
“That would have to be our last resort,” Cross finally said. “If the people lose confidence in the banking system again…we’ll be in for a long, destructive ride. Maybe if we had more details, but as it stands, we don’t even know what the risk is.”
“Agreed,” Simpson said. “Shutting everything down without pointing to a concrete reason wouldn’t be pretty.”
There was an uncomfortable silence before the president spoke. “Ms. Grayson, how much damage do you think they could do?”
“Significant damage, sir,” she said bluntly. “Which brings me to the third option.”
“I’m listening.”
“It’s the same as option one, only we inform the banks of the possible threat. At least that way they’ll know to keep a close eye on things. They can do more system backups and keep them for a longer period of time just in case.” Grayson looked down at her desk and took another deep breath, trying to keep her disappointment with their progress at bay.
The president finally asked, “If it got out that we knew something was up, couldn’t it jeopardize your work?”
“Yes, sir, it could. One cowboy techie bragging on the Internet could blow it and give it all away.”
President Cross took a moment before he replied. “Ms. Grayson, can you pull this off? You know, figure this all out in time to stop it?”
She sat up and nervously rubbed her forehead. The gravity of the president’s question weighed on her. His words meant that he believed in her, and that was enough.
“I don’t know for sure, sir, but yes, it’s possible. My team is working extremely hard.”
“Then do it. Make it happen. I’ll take option number four. You’re our best option. We’re”—he corrected himself—“the nation is counting on you and your team over there, and there isn’t much time.”