Joe Ledger: Code Zero Part 19

"Unknown."

"Jesus," I said. "We should keep a lid on this. Who's seen the video?"

Church sighed. "Too many people. This 'Mother Night' video, as it's already being called, appeared in an extraordinary number of places via a Trojan horse that contained some very sophisticated intrusion viruses. Conservative estimate is two hundred million computers have been infected, very likely over a period of weeks or months. Bug said you could position this kind of Trojan horse on search engines like Wikipedia or stream sites such as Netflix and Hulu. Naturally, every news network has broadcast it. Bug tells me that it has already gone viral on YouTube."

"s.h.i.t."

"There's more. Vice President Collins has been in touch with me."

"Of course he has," I said sourly. When Ghost heard the name Collins, he made one of his low growly noises. Not the kind of noise you'd want to hear when your name was mentioned. "Dare I ask what he said?"

Church pursed his lips. "He has officially informed me that his Cybercrimes Task Force is taking jurisdiction of this matter because he is convinced it falls under the umbrella of the VaultBreaker case."

"Really? 'Cause I think that whole attempted-murder thing in Baltimore dribbled the Mother Night case into our court."

"Not according to him," continued Church. "The Veep went on to say that we are to offer additional field support to the CTF."

"'Field support'?" I said, giving it the same inflection you'd give "n.u.t.s.a.c.k pimple."

"Yes. He would like us to run down a few things for him."

I smiled. "Like what? Pick up his dry cleaning and walk his dog? I mean, did I miss the part where we became his lackeys?"

"If so, then I missed the same memo. And it's highly likely that task list will be misfiled." Church pursed his lips. "The Veep is a difficult man to admire. However, our immediate concern is Mother Night."

He replayed the video.

"What's the deal with the anarchist rant?" I asked.

"The phrasing is a bit glib," he said. "It could be a deflection. Nor does it give us insight to her real agenda."

"Oh boy." I thought about it. "And Labor Day's on Monday. Are we thinking that the anarchy thing and Mother Night's field trips to mad science labs are connected? It's a stretch, but I can see it. Maybe. Labor is work, working for a wage, working for the system, working for the Man, that sort of thing. Could be some kind of proletariat link there-"

"It's possible," Church said dubiously.

"Wouldn't be the first time some bonehead's confused anarchy with socialism or Marxism. Most people don't know the difference."

He made a noncommittal sound, unconvinced.

I changed direction. "Much as I really hate to do it, I could also make a case for the anarchist comment and the bombs in Gettysburg and Lexington to be connected."

"I agree with you on that much," Church said. "It's why I sent teams to each location. Dr. Sanchez and Circe are currently reviewing the video in hopes of decrypting any possible subtext. It's Circe's fear that if this is an anarchist matter then the 'burn to shine' reference may be a coded call to arms."

"That's the same phrase Violin said had been painted in blood on a lab full of dead people."

"Yes," Church said, nodding. He tapped a key on his laptop and Bug's brown, bespectacled face filled the big screen on the wall. "Where are you with the 'burn to shine' a.n.a.lysis?"

"I have a couple of things so far. Oh, hey, hi, Joe. And is that Ghostie? How's it going, pups?"

Ghost thumped his tail a few times. He likes Bug. He doesn't wag his tail around Aunt Sallie or Dr. Hu. Ghost is a very discerning dog.

"Bug..." Church prompted.

"Right, burn to shine. That's a very pop-culture phrase. Kind of a twist off the old 'candle that burns brightest burns half as long.' Or maybe the other one, you know, it's better to burn out than fade away."

"Specific examples?" asked Church.

"Sure. Burn to Shine is the name of a series of direct-to-DVD film projects created by Christoph Green and Brendan Canty-he used to be the drummer for Fugazi. Get this-for each DVD they select a house that's scheduled for destruction and then get a local band to curate the event. They do a rock concert as part of the daylong event to destroy the house. The DVDs doc.u.ment each house's history and so on. Not recent, though. Last one was in 2008."

"'Destruction of houses,'" I echoed. "Gettysburg and Lexington...?"

"Possible," said Church, "or a general reference to destruction of any established structure or organization. Government, schools..."

"There's more," said Bug. "First off, a lot of musicians seem to grab that as a t.i.tle or lyric. There was an alb.u.m of that name by Ben Harper and the Innocent Criminals back in 1999. Rudy thinks that 'innocent criminals' could be one extreme interpretation of anarchists who cause destruction based on their beliefs that society needs to be torn down. If it's what society needs then it isn't criminal."

"Got it," I said. "Anything else?"

"Lots, but one more that Circe thinks might fit."

"Hit me."

"Remember that show, The Sopranos? The theme song was by a group called Alabama Three. There's a line, 'You're one in a million. You've got to burn to shine.'"

"Right," I said.

"Well, get this, in the context of that song that advice is given as a quote from the singer's mother. And, guys, remember, in the beginning of the song he wakes up and gets himself a gun."

Church said, "Ah."

"I'm compiling a list of all references in music, song, books, whatever. It'll be a long list, though, 'cause I'm including direct quotes and anything that kind of says the same thing."

"Good work, Bug," said Church. "Keep us posted."

"Wait," I said quickly. "Bug, did you get anywhere with those text messages I've been getting?"

Bug looked troubled. "Actually, Joe, Samson Riggs got one, too. Right after the fight in Virginia." He told me about it. "Same thing, though. No real caller ID and a dead end on a traceback."

"How's that possible? The only person who could block MindReader was Hugo Vox, and we now have that tech courtesy of that weasel Toys."

Toys, aka Alexander Chismer, was a wanted criminal who had first served as a.s.sistant and valet to Sebastian Gault and later to Hugo Vox and the Seven Kings. He was on the most-wanted list in thirty countries.

"What can I tell you, Joe?" said Bug.

"You can tell me where I can find Toys so I can park my car on him. If he's selling Vox's technology-"

"He's not," Church said. "In fact, Mr. Chismer was quite helpful to us since he resigned from the Seven Kings organization. He is not currently on our wanted list."

"He's on mine," I insisted.

Church gave me a long look through the tinted lenses of his gla.s.ses. "No, Captain, he is not. I believe you'll discover that Mr. Chismer has become quite a useful ally. He is, of course, under constant scrutiny. However, he is designated a friendly and that means all hands off."

It was not an invitation to a debate, though if there had been fewer things catching fire I might have pushed it. I wanted to know why Toys was no longer in the crosshairs.

Into the awkward silence, Bug said, "I have one more thing about 'burn to shine.' There are chat room rumors of an unlicensed video game called Burn to Shine that's being distributed through underground networks. We're trying to get our hands on a copy."

"What kind of game?" asked Church.

"That's where I think we're going to overlap with Mother Night," said Bug, "because from the chatter online it sounds like something that would appeal mostly to the real extreme anarchist crowd. Very edgy stuff. Rape, random murder of civilians, insurrection, and that sort of thing."

"Whatever happened to Pong?"

"Whatever happened to bearskins and stone knives?" replied Bug.

"Point taken."

"Find a copy of that game," ordered Church.

"Working on it. Apparently the CTF has tried several times to obtain copies but has not so far succeeded."

"The CTF couldn't find its a.s.s with a GPS," I observed, and no one disputed me.

"Got to go," said Bug, but he paused and spoke quickly to someone off camera, then came back to us. "Wait ... hold on ... something just came in. We've been running pattern searches on how Mother Night could have uploaded that video, and I think we figured something out."

Church brightened. "Tell me."

Bug launched into an explanation of how he tracked the video to a source, but it was total gobbledygook to me. I grunted to give the impression that I understood what he'd said.

"Give me the bottom line," I said. "Where was the source file uploaded?"

"I'm about ninety percent sure it was done at a cyber cafe called the Surf Shop in Park Slope. Corner of Fifth Avenue and Garfield Street."

That was an upscale part of Brooklyn.

I smiled and stood. "I'll take Top and Bunny. Maybe we're about to catch a break."

"We could use one," Church said. "I have a call scheduled with the president in five minutes, and I'll be talking to State later this morning."

"Does that mean you think we're seeing foreign nationals blowing up our fellow citizens? Because that would be really f.u.c.king big. Like missiles-in-the-air big."

"We haven't reached that conclusion yet, Captain," said Church. "We don't yet know if Mother Night is a foreign agent or an American working with them. We don't yet know if her current actions are her carrying out orders given by foreign powers or if this is something else. Something internal. In short-"

"-we don't know. I've been using that phrase a lot lately."

"Anonymity is a very effective weapon in the terrorist a.r.s.enal."

"Yeah, and doesn't that suck?"

As I turned to the door, Church asked, "Did anything else stand out from Mother Night's message?"

"Sure," I said, nodding to the plate on his desk. "If I was superparanoid I'd think the cookie reference was aimed at you. Could be a coincidence, though."

Church studied me in silence as he took another bite of his vanilla wafer.

"Or not," I said after a beat. "But aren't we reaching pretty far to take that personally?"

"At this point we don't know how far to take anything."

I nodded, depressed by that thought. I clicked my tongue for Ghost and headed out to find Top and Bunny.

Chapter Twenty-nine.

The Hangar Floyd Bennett Field, Brooklyn Sunday, August 31, 11:42 a.m.

Once he was alone, Mr. Church swiveled his chair to face the big flatscreen mounted on the wall. He hit some keys and the screen was filled with the Seal of the President. A few seconds later that was replaced by the face of the president, who was seated at his desk in the Oval Office. Paula Michelson, his chief of staff, came and stood behind him as they both stared into a laptop webcam.

"Deacon," said the president, "tell me something that will lower my blood pressure."

"I wish I could, Mr. President," said Church. "I have dispatched teams to Gettysburg and Lexington, and Captain Ledger is currently en route to a cyber cafe where we believe the Mother Night video was uploaded."

"That's something."

"We'll see." He then gave him everything from Circe, Rudy, and Bug. "We may be seeing the opening moves of something much larger."

"More bombings?" asked the president, his face grave.

"Impossible to antic.i.p.ate, but I would not place a heavy bet on having a peaceful rest of the day."

"The ATF is coordinating with the FBI on the bombings," the president said.

"Apart from the oblique reference by Mother Night," asked Church, "has anyone stepped forward to take credit for those attacks?"

Paula Michelson fielded that. "I just got off the phone with Central Intelligence and they're as flummoxed as the Bureau. There wasn't a whiff of this in the pipeline. No warnings, no threats, nothing."

"Who's tracking threats from the disenfranchised?" asked Church.

"The FBI is combing through recent events by suspected anarchists," said Michelson. "So far, nothing jumps out as a connection."

The president said, "This is Labor Day weekend, Deacon. That's not a particularly political event."

"No," Church agreed. "However, it is one in which we have people gathering in crowds for parties, games, and events; which means that a great number of people are going to be in motion and away from homes or offices."

"What does that matter?" asked Michelson.