Chapter 66

 

 

1901 hrs.

 

Imbecile! Did Kumar think measly armed men would throw him off the base camp? He couldn’t rely on fools. It did not matter any longer. In a few hours they’d all be gone.

Cress was on her way.

He cursed under his breath. No offspring of Nicole Cress’s going to ruin me.

With a sure hand on the steering wheel of technology systems, Cress would not be able to stand however aptly she’d reversed his hacks in London, six months ago. Mason’s fingers twitched as he gnawed on his thoughts. Nicole Cress was badgering around. The world was unstable and only when he gained full control of the operatives’ resources, could he defend the innocent–his way.

Innocents like my mother.

He had to stay focused. The only way he could steady the off-balance network systems had endured over the years, was to rebalance everything. Like the twenty-five network vulnerabilities at US power plants, the hacking attack on three South Korean broadcasters and two banks. How about the Pental-Marsh department store attack, which was installed from an insecure Wi-Fi network in one of the company's shops? More than sixty-five million people had their credit-card details stolen, or was the figure closer to a hundred million?

He could seize control of all these facilities' servers and balance them. Protect them.

Cress’s last interference to his software had created technological disharmony. It was time for that ageless proverb. An eye for an eye. That creates balance!

His thoughts traveled to the woman trapped in that little cell in Texas. His feeble mother.

Remember her in magnificence or it will make you weak!

He’d finally found the answer to that little problem. But he had to be careful; Cress was perceptive, much like him.

Mason cranked his hands and stepped out into daylight, halting at an approaching phantom across the horizon. For a minute, he thought he’d seen her.

Nicole Cress?

 

 

 

1816 hrs.

 

“You’re trespassing!” Sage’s brash voice punctured their ears. Calla never imagined she would see the red-haired, Santorini archer again.

She stood broad shouldered, the last born of the metamorphosed triplets, in a bodysuit too snug for desert hiking. Her arrow was marked at Calla’s middle. Behind Sage, approximately ten men in four-wheel-drive, desert Jeeps aimed accurately leveled firearms.

Ridge, the tall, watchful ninja, harboring a complex form of martial arts, who’d snatched her backpack in Akihabara market, bore into Calla with raged eyes that seemed to permanently slope his bushy eyebrows. A new confidence brimmed from the Shinobi, possibly because ten more like him gathered around him. How could she tell? Perhaps Mason, had concocted them all? Worse, they slithered like androids telepathized by his authority.

She stepped out of the Jeep, renewed strength coiling in her muscles. Nash shuffled out of the Jeep and bucked by her side taking her hand as his narrowed eyes contemplated the schemes brewing in her mind. “No, Calla,” he muttered. “There’s got to be more. These soldiers may not be normal.”

Nash was right. They’d been foisted and the trio was clearly outnumbered.

“We’re not trespassing,” Nash said. He slowly drew out the slip from the Chinese Embassy, and the local excavation permit Honghui had arranged. “This gives us ample permission to be here.”

Sage raised her bow and sizzled a furious arrow through the sheets of paper, pinning them in the cracked ground.

The enraged arrow missed Nash’s hand by mere centimeters. “This discussion is over. Let’s move,” Sage belted.

Calla and Nash stood immobile.

Calla contemplated their options. The desert was vast and they’d never outrun these thugs in a desert that extended six-hundred miles from west to east.

She eyed Jack back in the Jeep. A hoodlum traversed to his side and plowed him out of the backseat, hurtling him toward them. Jack limped along them as they were marched toward the camouflage vehicles, guns in their backs and enough arrows from Sage’s bow to pin a dozen tails on any donkey.

Calla caught the tiny movement of the muscles at the corner of Nash’s jaw. He leaned into her and whispered. “There’s an undercover military base not too far from here. It was on the satellite before we were ambushed.”

Jack tried to ignore the strange aching in his ankle as he leaned into them. “It’s the one the Soviet government helped build in the sixties. It was kept to monitor new energy resources here.”

The cold tip of a gun’s barrel dented in Calla’s shoulder. “Move!” commanded an armed criminal.

Jack ignored the harsh requests, probably getting used to it by now and leaned into Nash. “Do you think we can get communication over there? I think India may have been involved with that Soviet base. Any idea what diplomatic relations are like with them?”

“We need to reach Allegra. But even if we can jump these thugs, how do we get there? And the question is which side will they be on?” Calla said.

Nash rubbed a palm on his tight jaw. “Plus we don’t know who’s running it now.”

He squinted in the fading sun. “We need to find a way to get there. After the Cold War, Russia looked for ways to sell the base off and my take is the Chinese government reclaimed it.”

Calla raised her eyebrows scrutinizing several sheets of solar panels in the back of one Jeep. “Let’s just hope they are not headed there first.”

 

By the time the sun set on the wasteland, the Jeeps and horses accelerated into a large compound, sandwiched on a plain between two desert mountains. A technology oasis in the middle of the desert, set on a span of land that could have measured close to five-hundred acres.

A rusty smell hung in the air as Calla observed a legion of solar panels that traveled as far as she could squint. Hemmed in by the unforgiving desert on expansive acreage, they stretched across a desert flanked by high mountain ranges.

“Home sweet home,” Sage called as she dropped the back tail of the Jeep’s trunk. “Let’s go!”

Calla tilted her head. “Is that what you call it? That would explain your outlandish hospitality.”

Sage, and with the towering Rajput in tow, trooped them into a two leveled building, mostly cast out of containers, whose sides had been wedged with glass panels to admit sunlight. Once inside, Calla bore a cold breeze drifting through her body-armor shirt Nash had insisted they pack for the desert. Bulletproof on both sides, custom had warned her that should she ever glare into the eyes of the criminal who’s refused to expire, she would have advantage.

It was a smell that had graced her nostrils one too many times–expensive cologne so greasy it could sizzle a pan of stir-fry.

Her eyes glanced up.

Mason glared at her–a spike in her abdomen. She’d only hoped to see him behind a grate of bars.

 

 

 

Mason retracted and hustled to prepare a welcome that would greet Cress, a microchip, he could dislodge in her, safely nestled on a trigger in his hands. After he was done with her mind, she would be useless. He peered out the base window again and caught a glimpse of the trio. It was not Nicole.

The daughter will do for now.

She trekked over the fractured desert ground as an evening wind shrilled around them. Mason moved to the front of the building, twirling the silicon ship in his hand. Just a few more hours.

Sage and her brothers funneled the trio into the base’s main entrance. Mason suddenly felt warm. Had a breeze swept in? He clenched his jaw. He needed to look into her eyes and read what lay behind that knowledgeable mind. Operative or not, he knew how to get round her protected concentration, a detail the operatives had overlooked.

 

Calla stepped into the light. Her eyes bearing into his depth–cold as frost. She swallowed hard, trying to control the urge to be sick.

The marine was no different. Dry heaving coming from his throat and the other one, the ingenious mathematician and technology schemer. The last time he’d dealt with Kleve, he’d created a bugging device using computing techniques that could gnaw at any security network. Jack would have been a good confederate in his little ring of programmers.

Jack eyed Mason with a growing scowl on his face.

He has his limits too. Sage will see to it.

Mason took a step toward Calla. “You’ve finally seen it fit to have a conversation with me.”

Her lips warped into a snarl. “You belong in a penitentiary.”

“Prison is for criminals. I’m not a criminal.”

Nash took a step toward him, averting his eyes–his six-foot-three frame on-par with Mason. “What do you want this time?”

“I have a proposal for you.” Mason turned his attention to Calla. “It’s about your mother.”

She glimpsed over at Nash as he took a deep breath, visibly failing to relax. “The last time you discussed my mother, we ended up in a smoke bomb. No, thank you,” she said.

She stirred closer.

That’s it. Come nearer, my girl. Mason scrutinized her emerald eyes for several seconds. “It’s entirely up to you. I’ve devised a methodology–a network that connects the globe in one secure grid system. One, that’s impenetrable.”

“We’re not fooled, Mason. You’ve been wreaking havoc on security systems since you entered Belmarsh,” Calla said.

“Oh, that. That’s just to prepare for the finale.”

“What do you have in mind?” Jack said.

“Technology that involves a new level of encryption that reverses the engineering mechanisms through which most hacking is done.”

“Impossible,” Jack said. “Every system, at one time or another, reveals its vulnerabilities.”

“Exactly,” added Sage, her voice commanding and sensual. “Our system deciphers codes it would take ages to decrypt, even in today’s so called advanced computing age.”

Mason folded his arms across his chest. “My proposal to you and those who come on board with me is one; to provide the world with an impenetrable, unhackable network that governments, corporations and groups could buy from me and in return, they obtain an international manager for safe signals intelligence with my people on the watch, protecting them . . . really from nothing. But if they need the assurance, I’m there.”

“You mean sell your network soul to the cyber devil,” Calla said.

“Hm. . .stop giving me ideas,” Mason said. He turned to Nash. “Shields, think of it this way. It will be the NSA for the globe with the added benefit of supreme, network security at my affordable prices and cooperation. ”

“And bring global networks to their knees unless they pay for your hacking assistance. I don’t think so.”

Mason studied Nash. One of three men he’d encountered who could clash bullets mid-air. It was extremely difficult to hit a bullet or arrow midair, to the point of impossible. A skill many had trained at in ISTF and many had failed. But this one man, call it concentrated skill in weaponry and combat, he could. The key was to wait until the bullet reached the top of its trajectory and fire when the force of air resistance equaled the force of gravity. Shields was not only a skilled shooter, he had brains and Mason longed to get him in his telepathic chair, if only he could get him there before the marine’s gun went off.

Shields had been one of three men out of ten who’d been selected to train in the special skill at ISTF. Only three could time the precision of a fired bullet, based on a combination of body language from the attacker and the type of gun.

Mason drew in a sharp sniff. “That’s persuasion I’ll throw in. I may even use the NASA gimmick as a bartering chip. Sad to see that my methods are unconventional.”

“You want to be a networked, intelligence provider, just on the wrong side of the law,” Nash said.

Calla squinted, moving her gaze from Mason’s grueling stare.

Mason took a deep breath. She’s stronger than I thought. That was not easy. I couldn’t even move one memory or read one emotion.

Jack edged closer. “How exactly do you propose on creating this genius, unhackable network?”

“Ah, the tech expert! You and Sage could be the world’s leading innovators. I’m afraid I can’t reveal all my cards. Not just yet. My gift to the world is signals acumen. Why stop me from making global networks safer?”

Calla straightened her shoulders. “No, thank you, I prefer a joint approach.”

“Like ISTF? Five governments failing to make any cohesive decisions? By the way, I thought you may disagree, so here’s the real catch.”

She caught his eye. “Aye, there’s the rub.”

“I have a little favor I need, Cress. I may reconsider, if you hand over the whereabouts of your mother dead or alive. Ridge says she left you a message. That woman was no fool. She took something long ago that belonged to me, and I need it back.”

“What’s that?”

“That’s my affair. This way, please.”

They entered a darkened room which housed a few monitors. Mason pointed to the first monitor. “In eight hours, ninety percent of corporation networks will be synced to mine and not a soul will know that they’re being watched and manipulated. Every little piece of technology they use that requires a network avenue will be entirely at my disposal and control. The servers and satellites necessary are in place.”

“You must have taken decades to contract such a scheme,” said Jack.

“Exactly. Here's my deal.” His eyes caught Calla’s. “Perhaps it’s more like blackmail.”

Mason switched on a monitor.

Calla’s eyes traveled to a figure moving on the screen in oblivion. “Father?”

Stan sat reading in his study in the Cotswolds.

“There’s Stan Cress in his retirement manor unaware that his surveillance camera is in my control.” He shook his head. “Stan was once a promising secret service agent. I take it this is your father.” He grazed her shoulder with his thick palm, setting off an enraged glower from Nash. “Give me all the information your mother left you. I’ll find her dead or alive, or your father’s lovely manor will not only burn this time, it will sizzle.”

Mason’s lips curled into a smirk as he faced Nash. “I take it you have some experience with that.”

“So what will it be? Your father or your mother?”

 

 

 

2310 hrs.

 

Nash clenched his hands, grasping the metal grills of the cell. He imagined once it was as a panel storage room at the far end of the energy base camp. Ridge had escorted them into the stale space holding two beds, a stack high of solar energy panels and a sink. He glimpsed through the metal grate, looking both ways. The room used to be an old prison, possibly used when the Soviets created it. Tamper-proof storage like rooms lined both sides of the walkway.

Nash studied the floor where a heavy iron ring dented the cement about a meter from where he stood. Possibly used for prisoner punishment, or worse, solitary confinement. Calla sat on the edge of a drop-down bed, her head supported on her knees with her hands.

He made his way toward her. “Hey, beautiful, snap out of it. We’ve with been through worse.”

Jack sat idly on the stone slab opposite them. Mold and mildew crept past their nostrils, begging one to wonder how the base remained moist in a parched desert. Without a window or any sort of fresh air, Nash worried the stench might get to them.

“Could someone please tell me how we always get ourselves in such binds?” Jack said grinning at his non receptive cell phone. “The last time we were this intimate, was in a similar cell in Rome.”

Nash set a hand on Calla’s knee. “We’ll be out of here soon.”

“Mason is keen on playing god,” Jack said.

Sudden anger lit in Calla’s eyes. “He can’t.”

“Think of it,” Jack said, as sweat prickled his scalp. “If any government or corporation fails to cooperate with him, they risk network infection.”

Nash drew in a sharp breath. “You mean he’ll hack their networks anyway?”

“Exactly,” replied Jack. “That’s what the NASA hacks and those of the British Parliament have been about. He’s demonstrated that he is capable.”

Nash rose digging his hands into his hair. “Then global networks are at a standstill.”

Calla peered from one friend to another. “The only way anyone can stay secure and resist him is to stop using a cell phone, tablet, company network, a flight, e-mail or even a Wi-Fi system . . .”

Nash took a seat next to her on the rough blanket beneath them. “Essentially, anything related to a network.”

Calla breathed hard. Her usually lively eyes sparkled with weariness. “The choice will be to discard every item of technology we use, or cower under Mason’s radar. Think of it. Everything uses technology and a network. Even the food we eat.” She shot up and slammed a fist in her palm. “We can’t let that happen. That would mean rewriting history, going back to the drawing boards and starting a new Internet, a new world. I became a curator to explain history and take us into the future, not to destroy it. Which is what will happen, either way we go?”

“That’s right Cal,” Nash said. “We can’t let him take the network world hostage and risk redrafting a major part of history. The idea of data communications between computers began in the late sixties and early seventies. Researchers began progressing ways of connecting computers and exchanging information. If those network avenues are compromised, then so is network history. We would have to start again, or . . .” He glimpsed at Jack. “Hack his software like we did last time.”

Jack scratched his head. “Last time, we broke into his manor and found his logarithms. This time he has them bolted securely with the bionic witch, Sage.”

“And his brain,” Calla said.

Nash studied the low hanging bulb above them, before turning to the caged door that imprisoned them. The best way out was by deactivating the lock on the metal grill. He shot up and drifted to the grated door and tugged the iron before turning to Calla. She could break it with her bare hands. He was certain of it–with those same genes that had opposed gravity. Her head drifted back into her palm, with her elbows balancing on her knees. Had she given up? Their time had been marked for dawn–only six hours away. By then she’d have to surrender all she knew about her mother, the little information she had.

Nothing.

Nash leaned his back into the solid grate grills and studied her. She raised her head back–eyes swollen with anguish, confusion and struggle written on her face. He managed a weak smile. “Calla, you can break that lock.”

Jack set his back against the far wall, the whites of his eyes flashing. He was thinking the same thing.

Nash strode to where she sat, and dipped to his knees in front of her. He shifted a lock of hair from her eyes. “Cal, he took my gun, we have nothing but you now.”

“Even if I did, Nash. Then what? Sprint through the desert without supplies, water or communication. We’re in the middle the second largest, bloody desert in the world.”

“We can’t give up now.” He glanced over at Jack. “There’s a way and we can find it–together.”

He longed to get closer to her. To encourage the closeness that had escalated when they were alone in Colorado and most recently in Paris, but he knew from experience that he could lose her that way. Helping Calla reach her potential had made him lose sleep. She could outsmart Mason. He knew it. But she had to want to.

Calla weighed him with a critical squint. “We have no time. What if—”

“No, Cal,” Jack said. “We don’t entertain bullies. Come on, you learned that at Beacon Academy.”

Jack shot up and paced the little cell. “There must be some way to reverse the worm and break into that brain of his.”

Calla pulled out the three shreds of medieval cloths and unrolled them. “My father is alive. I don’t know if my mother is. Doesn’t it make sense to save the one who is?”

Both stood speechless. Jack spoke first. “I don’t know what the correct choice is, but without your mother Mason cannot instigate his scheme. I feel it. Almost as if he needs her.”

“He must have some personal vendetta with her. Something she did to him,” Nash added.

Calla peered in to the glares. “I promised my father that if Nicole is alive, things would be restored between them, that he could finally have closure with her.”

Nash’s chest caved in. How does one make such a decision?

Regardless of how he felt about his father, it was highly unlikely he could choose between his own parents. No one should have to face such a choice.

“How does anyone choose between two parents, Nash?”

She had read his mind.

He could do nothing for her.