CHAPTER 23
Secure Comms Room
Clocktower Station HQ
Jakarta, Indonesia
Josh had to think. Whoever had replaced the live feed of the door to the quiet room was no doubt outside, trying to get in. The glass room in the giant concrete tomb seemed so fragile now. It hung there, just waiting to explode, like a glass pi?ata. He was the prize inside.
Was there something on the door? A spec of orange? Josh walked to the edge of the glass room and looked closer. It was a tiny spec growing brighter, like a heating element. It made the metal look wet, yes the metal was flowing down the door. In that instant, sparks flew out of the top right corner of the door. The sparks slowly crept down the door, leaving a narrow, dark rut behind.
They were coming in — with a torch. Of course. Blowing the door — using explosives — would obliterate the server room. It was just one more safety measure, meant to give whoever was inside more time.
Josh raced back to the table. What to do first? The source, the message on Craigslist. He had to respond. His email address, [email protected], was clearly fake — that address had probably been available for all of 2 seconds after gmail launched — the source knew Josh would know that, knew he would see it for what it was — just another name with the proper length to decrypt the message using the code. The code… he would have to make up a message and name that followed the code.
He glanced over. The cutting torch was now 1/2 way down the right side of the door. The sparks burned toward the ground like a fuse eating its way to a bomb.
Screw it, he didn’t have time. He clicked the post button and wrote a message:
Subject: To the man at Tower Records.
Message: I wish we could have connected but there wasn’t time. I’m afraid I may be out of time again. My friend sent me your messages. I still don’t understand. I’m sorry for being so direct. I really don’t have time to play games with mixed messages. I couldn’t reach my friend on the phone, but maybe you can contact him on this board. Please reply with any information that could help him. Thanks and good luck.
Josh hit send. Why couldn’t he reach David? He still had internet access — it must be on a completely different connection — a connection the Clocktower operatives didn’t know about. It made sense for the secure phone and video conference. The door camera was easy: they could have cut the cord and connected it to another video source or simply placed a picture of the hall in front of the camera and let it run.
Out of the corner of his eye, Josh saw the display with the red dots change quickly — the dots in the safe houses were massing at the doors. They were making a move. Then they disappeared. Dead.
Josh’s eyes returned to the door. The torch was picking up speed. He refreshed the Craigslist page, hoping the contact would respond.