Skyhook

FOURTEEN WEDNESDAY, DAY 3 UNIWAVE FIELD OFFICES ELMENDORF AFB, ALASKA

Normally, teamwork delighted Ben Cole, even when performing under the sword of a make-or-break deadline. A lab full of happily collaborating professionals was always a joy of intellectual synergy — except today. For the previous four hours, dealing with the constant communication of his team when he wanted to work alone had created perhaps the most agonizing challenge of his professional life.

“I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go sit down and work quietly for an hour or so,” Ben said at last, triggering no objections as his people continued their intense efforts, going back and forth over the various ways the program might have failed.

At any moment, Ben figured, one of his team was bound to make the same discovery he’d made, stumbling onto the thousands of lines of inserted, renegade code. If not, he would have to make the “discovery” himself and pretend to be astounded.

First, however, he needed time alone in his office, which was little more than a larger cubicle in a “cubeville” collection of partitions on one side of the lab. He retreated there now and entered the necessary access codes, quickly retrieving the comparison copy of the program from a half year before and entering the now-familiar commands to run a general line-byline comparison with the latest version. The supercomputer began working as Ben sat back and waited for the results, which finally flashed on the screen: “No differences.”

He leaned forward, wondering where the lines of code could be.

What did I screw up?

He checked the dates on the program copies and started the comparison again.

Once more it yielded no differences.

Ben felt his pulse accelerating. There was no doubt he was working with the very same copies he’d illicitly transmitted home the day before. He opened the machine-code list on the latest version and entered the memorized line number which should take him straight to the first section of the illicitly added computer codes. But that particular line came up completely normal and identical to the original program.

This can’t be!

He ran through the lab’s secure program files, checking several more developmental copies and finding nothing out of the ordinary before sitting back, a cold sweat forming on his brow.

It isn’t here! But… I didn’t just imagine it. If I saw what I saw and I still have the evidence safely stashed away, and these are the copies they came from…

There was only one remaining explanation, and the realization coursed through his veins like ice water: Someone had electronically entered their main databank and erased the renegade lines of computer code. Hacking from outside was effectively impossible. Only someone within Uniwave could be responsible.

Ben stood up and looked through the opening of his cubicle, watching his team members for a moment as his thoughts raced around the problem of what to do and who might be responsible. The main evidence was gone, and he’d come within a finger stroke of destroying the only remaining record before leaving his house.

But that remaining record was no threat to whoever was behind the sabotaged code, and they had to know it. Ben shuddered at the symmetry of the dilemma. He was checkmated. If he revealed what he’d found, his career would be over and he’d end up in a federal prison somewhere. But if he didn’t blow the whistle, the saboteurs would succeed, probably causing the crash of all aboard during the final test flight in the Gulfstream, himself included.

He thought about going straight to Joe Davis and reporting the existence of the renegade code, and then pretending to “find” it missing when he brought Joe back to the lab.

Impossible, Ben concluded. Without the concrete evidence he had but couldn’t reveal, there was no way he’d convince Joe or Martin or anyone else in authority to stop the re-test and risk bankruptcy.

“Ben?” Gene Swanson had been standing next to Ben for several minutes, invisible to him, wondering where Ben’s mind was. “You okay? You looked zoned out there,” Gene said.

Ben sighed and rubbed his brow as he tried unsuccessfully to laugh. “Yeah. I do feel a little strange.”

“You said you were taking a cold medicine… maybe it’s a virus and not a cold. Not that a cold isn’t a virus, but… you know what I mean.”

“Yeah.” Ben smiled at him and clapped a hand on his shoulder in an ineffectual attempt at reassurance as a desperate possibility coalesced in his head. “I’m, ah, going to run out to the aircraft and check a few things, Gene. Where are we in the process?”

“We’ve found nothing,” Gene replied, a puzzled expression crossing his face. Ben held up a finger.

“Ah… no one removed any sections from the master code for testing or anything this morning, right?”

Gene Swanson looked stunned. “Removed? You mean, without authorization?”

“No, I mean… maybe a test copy or something.”

“What are you asking, Ben? None of us would do that.”

Ben shook his head again. “Just a thought, and obviously a silly one. I know you know this, but we’re under such pressure, if any of you find any section of the master code that’s been contaminated in any way, isolate and copy that section and wait for me to get back, okay?”

“Well… sure. We would anyway.”

Ben left the lab as Gene moved back to the main test stand.

“What was that all about?” one of the other programmers asked.

“Frankly? I think Ben’s losin’ it.”

The short drive to the secure hangar where Uniwave’s Gulfstream was housed took less than five minutes, but processing through the security entrance took an additional fifteen since the name “Ben Cole” was not listed on the approved roster for that precise day and hour. First Lindsey, then Joe Davis, had to get involved by phone, verbally approving his visit after questioning why he needed to be there.

“Just checking a theory about the programming,” Ben explained.

“Yeah, but, Ben,” Joe Davis replied, “you bring the central hard drive back with you after each flight. There’s nothing out there to see.”

Ben glanced over at the security officers and smiled, rolling his eyes at the shared agony of dealing with bureaucratic machines.

“Joe, I could ask you the same thing in reverse. Is there something out here I’m not supposed to see?”

“No. No, of course not.” There was a hesitancy in Joe Davis’s voice, but it didn’t register in Ben’s thinking.

“Well, I’m chief software engineer, Joe, and the computer out here still has software embedded in it, and I’d like to look at it. Why is that a problem?”

“It isn’t, now that you’ve explained yourself,” Joe replied. “You should let people know, Ben. Don’t just show up. It makes our security people very nervous.”

The Gulfstream sat freshly washed and sparkling in the lights of the windowless hangar as Ben walked to the entrance and climbed aboard, pausing to look to his left into the technical complexity of the cockpit. Somehow the Gulfstream had reverted to the exciting, friendly, safe environment he’d always considered it, almost as if the nightmare of the uncontrolled descent two nights before had never happened.

There were technical manuals open on the copilot’s seat, and the captain’s seat had been pulled back to its full extent.

Must be the T-handle installation, Ben mused as he let his eyes roam over the area left of the captain’s rudder pedals, where the emergency disconnect T-handle was supposed to be. He could hear voices in the hangar and hurried footsteps apparently approaching the entry stairs.

The telltale signs of a new installation were there, all right, along with the manual disconnect handle, which would physically knock the autoflight relays away from the flight controls if the computer glitched again. It was a comforting feeling to see the little handle, and he knew the pilots would equally appreciate having a way to pull the computer’s silicon hands from their throat if anything else went wrong.

The footsteps were coming up the Gulfstream’s entry stairs behind him, and Ben casually took note, letting his eyes rest on the engineering plans laid out on the copilot’s seat. They were obviously the installation instructions for the emergency disconnect T-handle. The word “copy” was stamped in the upper left-hand corner over the more detailed engineering identification box, but it contained another stamped word he couldn’t quite make out.

Ben could hear someone approaching the top of the stairs as he reached out and moved the top page to get a better look at the papers.

“Anyone here?” a male voice asked from the entryway, distracting him.

“Yes. Ben Cole. I’m in the cockpit.”

A heavyset, worried-looking man moved in behind him and leaned over, snatching the engineering papers off the copilot’s seat.

“Is there a problem?” Ben asked, twisting around and looking up to catch the man’s eyes.

“No. I just left these… maintenance papers here,” he said.

“I’m Ben Cole, chief software engineer,” Ben said, extending his hand as he got to his feet.

“Ah… Don Brossard,” the man said, reluctantly shifting the papers to his left hand and meeting the handshake.

“You’re maintenance?”

Ben saw Brossard’s eyebrows rise visibly. The man nodded, his eyes darting to the entry way with a clear desire to bolt and run. “Yeah. Sorry… I’ve got a… a conference.” He pointed toward the far door of the hangar.

“Understood, but before you go, let me ask you a question about that emergency disconnect handle you just installed.”

Brossard nodded. “Yeah?”

“Is it operational yet, and have you tested it?”

“I’m sure that… whatever they’re supposed to do has been done. You’ll have to ask the chief of maintenance about that. I’m just supposed to bring these papers.”

“You’re not doing the installation?”

“Not if it’s complete. Look, I’m sorry, Mr. Cole, but I’ve gotta run. Nice meeting you.”

Ben watched him descend the steps and hurry out of the hangar before moving back into the spartan cabin and running a series of tests on the computers in search of a stray copy of the main Boomerang program.

After an hour of careful probing, it was obvious it was wasted effort. Ben stood and moved back toward the front entry door and the cockpit, visualizing the final flight test and wondering if the two pilots would be able to pull the new T-handle fast enough if the program went nuts again. It was prominent enough and large enough to get a hand around easily, and judging from the complexity of the engineering drawings he had seen, it had obviously been carefully conceived.

Something about the plans snagged his memory, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it. Ben looked around to see if anyone was observing him, but the hangar appeared empty. He leaned into the cockpit out of curiosity and decided to sit down in the surprisingly comfortable captain’s seat, his eyes on the red T-handle.

Ben let his left hand close around the cool metallic mass of the red T-handle as he absently wondered how much force was required on the specially installed device to actually pull the autoflight servos free of the control cables somewhere below in the Gulfstream’s belly. He pulled gently on the handle to gauge the resistance, unprepared for the response, as the T-handle came off smoothly in his hand, effortlessly trailing a loose length of cable.

Ben raised the handle to eye level, feeling a flash of guilt for breaking something that shouldn’t have been touched, before realizing with a start that the cable had been loose for a very specific reason: It had never been attached to anything.

He threaded the cable back in and replaced the T-handle, recalling the strained encounter with the maintenance man, who had apparently been trying to retrieve the T-handle installation order before Ben Cole could find it. Lindsey had promised him the disconnect would be installed, but if the installation was complete, this was a placebo, a dummy device for show only.

There had been a word stamped in the information block of the papers Ben had seen, and he tried to pull up the visual image of it now, wondering if it was a growing paranoia or reality working to convince him the word he’d seen was “canceled.” If so, Lindsey had lied to him.

He scrambled out of the seat and almost fell down the Gulfstream’s airstairs in his hurry to leave the hangar as fast as possible. There was a parking lot across the road adjacent to the base exchange and he found a spot and parked, letting the engine idle as he tried to think through the growing puzzle.

Am I being watched? he wondered, glancing around. Why would they lie about the emergency disconnect? Or could the installation just not have been complete? No. If it were incomplete, why send a nervous maintenance guy to snatch the plans away?

He recalled the delay getting admission to the Gulfstream hangar in the first place, and his suspicions coalesced.

Davis! He tried to talk me out of getting aboard because he didn’t want me to find out they’d canceled the disconnect. Davis and Lindsey are in on this together, but do they have anything to do with the renegade lines of code and their disappearance?

Lindsey’s smiling face returned to his thoughts, along with the very pleasant memory of her hair brushing his face the day before, that invigorating wave of femininity now drying into the brittle reality that she had merely been using him. He felt betrayed and helpless.

The memory of the terror two nights before when their jet dove toward the ocean and skimmed the surface returned. That icy fear was all too familiar, like the childhood dream of trying to run from the monster but being unable to move an inch. The memory of those few moments of panic and indecision was enough for a lifetime. Going up again was okay as long as they had the manual disconnect, but without it, and with dangerously unknown lines of code appearing and disappearing in the master program, the possibility that the next test would be fatal was growing at almost the same speed as the conclusion that he was helpless to stop the disaster.

He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the lab.

“I’m… really feeling lousy, Gene,” Ben said, keeping his voice even. “Unless you seriously need me back there to look at anything new, I think I’m going to go home and go to bed.”

“Go home, Ben. Nothing new to talk about.”

He punched the disconnect button and put the car in reverse. He had no doubt that he was little more than a pawn now, and just along for the ride.

Could I be wrong? There was little hope of that. But the question of why hung in the air as he put the car in gear and moved out of the parking lot.