Chapter 70
The last two weeks had passed so quickly it seemed to Heather they were gone in the blink of an eye. Of course, the buzz around school was all about basketball and how the Hilltoppers had breezed through the district tournament. Now it was on to the state basketball tournament at The Pit in Albuquerque, the traditional home court of the University of New Mexico Lobos.
But what had made the time truly fly was the progress Mark, Heather, and Jennifer made on the cold fusion power supply that would drive their subspace transmitter. The initial tests had gone so well that they had grown cocky, something that had nearly gotten them all killed last Saturday morning.
Deciding that they were ready for a full up test, the three teens had brought the power supply online. Jennifer had been at the controls while Heather monitored measured power output versus that predicted by the mathematical model. All had gone well until a diode on the primary control circuit board burned out, sending a massive power spike through the system. Only Jennifer’s quick reflexes in switching to the backup controller had prevented the power from reaching dangerous, perhaps even deadly, levels.
Although Heather thought the scare probably took two years off her expected life span, the test demonstrated that their backup system worked. It also convinced them they needed more automated fail-safe circuitry.
While Jennifer worked on that, Mark finished building a sophisticated bug detector. A sweep of their houses revealed three bugs in each house, not counting the phone lines, which they just assumed were being monitored. Tiny transmitters were hidden in each kitchen, office, and master bedroom.
After the initial sweep, Mark had become concerned there might also be hidden burst transmitters, which stored data but only sent out quick transmissions at infrequent intervals. Only after he had conducted an extended test did he relax, convinced he had found every bug.
Heather’s personal life was improving too. With the Rag Man gone, her mood lifted, restoring a joy that she had not realized was missing. Also, Raul was rapidly becoming a very good friend, not in the same way that Mark and Jennifer were almost family, but a good friend nonetheless. He didn’t press his attentions on her. He was just there when she needed someone to talk to, providing a respite from the drama surrounding her and the twins.
In a wonderful departure from what you would normally expect from a boy his age, Raul listened to her with an easiness that showed he didn’t feel he had to prove himself to her. And that allowed him to actually hear what she was saying. Even his strongly held religious beliefs built no wall between them. In fact, when Heather had asked to attend one of Raul’s Bible study sessions, he had laughed but demurred, telling her that he just wouldn’t feel right pushing his beliefs on her. It gave Heather a warm feeling inside to be around someone who had such a perfect understanding of who he was.
But this was a new Saturday, and there was no time for more than fleeting thoughts of school, basketball tournaments, or even Raul. Heather had barely gotten to sleep last night. After all, today was the day.
Heather had even begged off on the family shopping trip to Santa Fe, saying the science project demanded her full attention today. Although her mother had looked skeptical, her dad had understood. A science project was a science project. Heather had not even had to lie, except by omission.
Today was the day when she, Jennifer, and Mark would become the first humans to tap into the Secret Internet Protocol Router Network, or SIPRNet as it was more commonly known, via an undetectable subspace signal. Actually, that wasn’t quite right. The subspace signal could be detected, but only if you had a correctly tuned subspace receiver, something that was pretty unlikely.
Heather was so excited she could barely contain herself. If all went according to plan, they could generate a remote digital signal on any line in the world, assuming they could attain the exact four-dimensional coordinates for that line. And that went for fiber-optic lines as readily as wired networks.
That concept was truly magical: In an optical fiber line, light carried the information instead of an electrical signal, as in a wire line. But in the subspace to normal space interface, there was no difference in the way either signal was generated. It was delicious. The NSA was about to get quite a shock.
It was no great surprise for Heather to discover that Mark and Jennifer were already gathered around the computerized control system for their subspace transmitter by the time she entered the Smythe garage. Her two friends huddled under the tall halogen lamp that provided indirect illumination to the work area.
Heather slid into the folding chair beside Jennifer, a spot she had come to think of as the copilot’s seat. As Jennifer’s fingers danced across the keyboard of the laptop, gradually bringing the cold fusion tank online, Heather monitored the output indicators. So long as everything stayed within projected norms, she just had to help with the tuning of the subspace wave steering.
Mark was on call with his language skills. Since seeing Jack deal with the Rag Man, Mark had become fascinated with spy agencies. He had read everything he could find on the subject and had also determined to understand the technical side of remotely tapping into the SIPRNet.
“So we’re going to tap into one of the lines directly inside the Puzzle Palace?” Mark asked.
“That’s the plan,” said Heather. “We have the coordinates for the building on Ft. Meade, but picking a line is going to take us a while.”
“From what I read, all of the SIPRNet lines will be shielded in TEMPEST-rated facilities.”
Jennifer raised her head. “What is TEMPEST?”
Mark turned back toward his sister. “It’s a code word used to describe the way secure systems have to be shielded so that the electromagnetic signals they give off can’t be monitored remotely.”
“Yes,” said Heather. “Even typing on a keyboard produces little electronic signals that leak out into the surrounding space. They are weak, but if someone has the right equipment, they can pick up the signal and find out exactly what you were typing. The same thing applies for all electronic equipment.”
Mark nodded. “So, TEMPEST-rated facilities have special requirements, like being wrapped with metal or wire mesh that blocks those electromagnetic signals from escaping.”
“But that won’t cause us any problem,” said Heather. “Every signal has a tiny leakage into subspace, and no TEMPEST countermeasures will stop that. We’ll be able to pick up the signals from any network once we narrow in on a specific line and pick up the data flowing across it. We only need a tunable subspace receiver for that.
“But putting a signal back on the remote line is what requires all this power and the subspace transmitter. And since we’re the only ones with a subspace receiver-transmitter, we’re the only ones that can do this.”
Jennifer glanced at her readings. “Power levels at seventy-seven percent. Now eighty.”
Heather leaned in closer. “Okay. Nice and steady.”
“Eighty-five.”
“Keep it coming.”
“Ninety-three.”
“Okay now, ease off a bit. Steady up at around ninety-eight and let it stabilize.”
“Got it. Coming up on ninety-six now. All right. Ninety-seven. Backing down a bit more on the stimulation. There it is, ninety-eight and holding steady.”
Heather stared at the displays for several seconds before she was satisfied. “Ever so slowly now, nudge it up that last two percent.”
For almost two minutes Jennifer worked the keyboard, making incremental adjustments to the reaction controlling signal strength. On the side of the tank, the banks of colored LED lights twinkled as data cascaded through the various registers in the central processing unit. As Jennifer watched that, Heather focused on the computer monitor. Perfect.
The sound from the cold fusion apparatus was surprisingly loud. This occurred because the reaction produced heat, and that heat produced steam, which in turn they siphoned off to drive a steam-powered electric generator. The generator itself only produced a whirring sound, but the steam whistled out with a sound reminiscent of a teakettle.
“You know, that is really getting to be annoying,” said Mark.
“I agree,” said Jennifer. “We’re going to have to come up with a better design for the steam recycler or we’ll go deaf.”
“We just have to put up with it a little while,” said Heather. “Just long enough for us to find a SIPRNet line and put the message on it.”
They didn’t actually need the electricity the project generated, just the gamma ray flux. But since the purpose of the science project was to provide a household energy source driven by cold fusion, they had to have that part of it. Besides, there had to be a means of dumping the excess heat that cold fusion generated, and the state transition of liquid water to steam was a good way of doing that.
Heather read off the latitude and longitude of the Puzzle Palace, allowing a few extra seconds for Jennifer to synchronize the system with Greenwich Mean Time via a remote time server.
Despite having an accurate coordinate for the building, their difficulty was going to lie in the massive amount of electronic systems inside. When they tuned their subspace receiver to that spot, the close proximity of computer systems and network cabling would make it hard to find a particular one, at least the first time.
On the plus side, it didn’t really matter which subnet they accessed within the Puzzle Palace, so long as it was a SIPRNet. Since almost everything in the building was classified, that was not going to be hard to find.
“Got one.” The excitement in Jennifer’s voice crackled like static on a New Mexico AM radio station.
“How’s the signal strength?” Mark asked.
“Beautiful. And the power grid is stable too. Give me just a second to confirm the subnet's SIPRNet status.”
Jennifer’s fingers danced across the keyboard as a stream of data scrolled through a window on the monitor and lit the LED panel like a Christmas tree at the North Pole.
Jennifer leaned back, beaming. “That’s it. We’re in.”
Heather took a deep breath. Oh, Jesus. They had really done it.
“Okay, putting a test sync pattern on the network.” Jennifer typed a quick command. “I’ve got confirmation. The pattern has been successfully uplinked to the SIPRNet.”
Mark let out a low whooping sound. “All right. Now uplink the message and then let’s power down.”
“There’s really no rush,” said Heather. “We absolutely cannot be traced. To them it will look like the signal just appeared inside their own network, and if they trace it back to its origin, they will find out it originated on a fiber inside their own building.”
“Christ, this is great.”
Heather frowned. “Still, I guess it would be wise not to spend too long surfing their network, at least for the moment. It might be a little hard to explain what we’re up to if your parents come back home unexpectedly.”
“Are you kidding? I’ve got that story down. Our little science project here is cutting their electric bill.”
Jennifer shook her head. “Better safe than sorry, though. I’m ready to send.”
Heather leaned in closer. “Go for it.”
Originally, they had put together a wordy message to the NSA. But after lengthy discussions, they had agreed less was more. With that in mind, they had settled on a very short message, encrypted with the same breakable encryption code as the earlier message their virus had delivered. That should get someone's attention.
“Well, here goes nothing.”
Amidst the cascading display of colors from the LED panel and the whistling rush of their steam-powered generator, Jennifer’s slender fingers flew across the keys like a concert pianist performing the works of Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninov. As Heather watched her friend at work, gooseflesh rose along her arms. Those dancing fingers were about to unleash a firestorm the like of which the NSA had never seen.