“How significant is this signal?” she asked.
“Abnorm level four’s not too unusual. It happens once or twice a week. I was at a five once.”
The tech rose from his chair and stepped closer to the monitor. A second sound joined the clamor of the alarm. The rhythm of the lights changed. “Six, now seven,” said the tech, pointing to an array of numbers and tall orange bars. The tech gritted his teeth, then calmly stated, “This has to be an earthbound spoof. We’re reading a series of primes sixty-eight digits long, longer than what we sent.”
“How sustainable?” Riggins shouted.
“Eighty seconds. I’ll secure the backup line.”
The mood of the dozen or so men changed palpably. Riggins pulled his phone from his pocket. “I’ll call the Op Center down the hall.” Into his phone, he said, “Yeah, you’re seeing it? Seven at this point? Anything that—”
“Status normal but we’re not triangulating the source well. Abnorm unchanged.”
A side door that Aki had barely noticed swung open quickly.
“It’s a breach,” barked a large man who looked upset.
“Tom, we’re at… oh.” Watching him speak, then watching him lean back against the wall, Aki could imagine how Dan Riggins felt.
“Phreaked. False positive through an audio channel.”
The large man waved Director Riggins and Aki toward him, then grunted that they should follow him through the door. Unsure where she was at first, Aki realized it was this man’s office and also where the parallel supercomputer was housed, protected by a soundproof glass partition.
“You scanned the terminals in the building?”
“I’m one of three people who’re authorized to go outside the intranet, and there are maybe three others who work in the building and would be able to chew through the security walls,” said the man that Dan had called Tom. Aki concluded that Tom was some sort of sysadmin. “I loaded a sniffer. This was done using a keystroke logger on a news server. It shouldn’t have been able to get in from there but someone squirmed in through a back door. It’s always social engineering. I bet the hacker got multiple morons to divulge their passes and then pretexted or baited.” Tom swore and punched his desk hard. Aki stepped as far away from him as she could considering the small dimensions of the room.
“I’m sorry I’m upset. They’re as smart as we are and use the same tools. I just hate that someone would try to screw over the vestiges of humanity who actually care enough to try to rebuild this godforsaken planet.”
“Calm down, Tom,” Riggins said gently, then looked at Aki. “I’m sorry you had to see this. I’m sorry that you were here for this at all. Let’s go back to my office.”
“Problems are as much a part of the scientific method as solutions. It was resolved quickly and did not spin out of control.”
“This event was a first, Ms. Shiraishi,” he said, opening the door for her. Tom had his head in his hands but looked calmer.
“Director Riggins, I am going to let you focus on the follow-up and excuse myself. I will return tomorrow around ten.” Walking down the hallway and reaching the elevator, the doors opened as soon as Aki arrived. She held her hand in the way to prevent them from closing.
“Of course, that sounds fine.” Riggins looked relieved.
Stepping into the elevator, Aki put her hands to her sides and bowed as the doors began to close. Dan Riggins imitated as best he could, bending awkwardly. Aki appreciated his attempt at politeness and responded with a curt Western nod and smile.
ACT IV: MARCH 12, 2024
THE NEXT DAY, Aki found herself in the director’s office again.
“The perpetrator is a student. I had heard his name before,” Director Riggins said.
“He was accessing your computer from somewhere on campus?”
“It’s embarrassing, Aki. He connected from the computer science building.”
“Was it a prank, or was he trying to damage your system?”
“He claimed it was an accidental incursion generated by his artificial intelligence system, which he had quietly introduced into our network. He’s supposedly studying automata-based programming; AIs that can make internal state distinctions. Half his explanation was over our heads and half was lies, but we couldn’t identify which part was which.” Dan wasn’t wearing a tie but looked less distraught than he had yesterday.
“Testing AI? And he needed your resources to do this?”
“That’s what we thought. He insisted he needed the best supercomputer available. He applied for access last month. We do liaison work with the college. He was denied because our mission is to provide for Builders-relevant research only.”
“Is he in custody?” Aki asked.
“We held off, because we’re military and on a campus. Incarcerating him is an option, but Berkeley students like to protest. Tom was right that it’s simple to bait our people, even though we train for alertness. You’re not going to believe this, but he sprinkled a handful of thumb drives with the Golden Bears logo in the parking lot. At least three employees on the news server plugged them in and looked at pictures of somebody on the girl’s lacrosse team in a bikini, triggering a Trojan horse that stole their passwords. I would’ve thought that high security meant not having our staff hack themselves by loading his malware for him—”
“How do I get in touch with him?”
Riggins was confused by Aki’s request. “He’s a screwy nineteen-year-old undergrad. We can certainly make him available to you, but he can’t be useful to the work we do.”
“Black swans. He makes me curious. I want him to tell me what he was looking for. Maybe he resents the UNSDF having a facility on his campus and maybe he wanted to show off, but I am a proponent of pulling on threads to see what we can unravel.”
With a shrug, Riggins scribbled a name and email address onto a Post-it and handed it off to Aki. Raul Sanchez. Aki wondered where he was from. She texted the message: I would love to meet up. Name the place and I will show, making sure to send it from an authorized account so that he would know it was her…or a fake from a hacker skilled enough to be interesting, at least. With a nod and a promise to share any relevant information she uncovered, Aki left the office. She was unsure of where to go but did not need to wait. Raul responded within two minutes, saying to go to a restaurant near Soda Hall. Aki brought up a map on her PDA and walked across campus.
It was a small, self-service cafeteria with a limited menu of sandwiches, coffee, and soft drinks. Aki got two coffees and perched on a stool near a window. Back when she had been in college, it had been all work and no play. She dressed the same then as she did now. Seeing the wild attire of Cal students, from dreadlocks to shaved heads, she thought about how her only change was that a few of her blazers were now form-fitted. Aki felt older than thirty-four.
Raul smiled broadly when he saw her. He needed a shower and was wearing a denim jacket three sizes too big. She handed him the coffee she had known he would want. Watching him take a sip, barely keeping from spilling, she noticed that his hands were trembling.
“Aki Shiraishi in the flesh. I knew it wasn’t a setup because they let me go. Is ‘fan’ the right word?”
“Who knows? Being me is more about getting the work done than caring about who is watching. I need to know what you are up to.”
Raul made a face, a grimace that led into a smirk. “I can’t believe I’ve been summoned by you.”