The Darkfall Switch (18 page)

‘You mention a shortfall,’ she said. ‘What’s that?’

‘The demand for electricity is constantly present, and you can’t store it in anything like large enough quantities. So if you shut down one source of power, another one has to be found. There are peaks and falls in demand, but it’s always there – day in and day out.’

‘So whenever I turn on a light, a power station has to work harder?’

‘A tiny bit, yes. But when a Cup Final ends and millions of people rush out to their kitchen and all turn on their kettles at the same time the sudden rise in demand is enormous.’

‘Gosh!’

‘Yes. And you’ll see how big a power station is tomorrow. It’s a massive lumbering beast: it can’t respond instantly to changes in demand; it takes hours to start up, and it’s slow to respond.’

‘So wouldn’t smaller be better?’

‘Smaller is certainly quicker, but it’s much less efficient and a lot more dirty.’

She smiled. ‘I can see tomorrow’s going to be really interesting. I just hope I haven’t gone off you by the end of the day.’

‘I promise to try not to bore you.’

They set off early the next morning and reached Queensborough by 11. Bill Kirkland came to meet them at the gatehouse and smiled appreciatively as he handed Janet her hard hat.

‘I gather from Dan that you’d like to look round the plant,’ he said, and when she nodded he added, ‘We’ll go up to the training suite first. I’ll show Dan what he needs and then I’ll take you round.’ He turned to Foster and added, ‘Is that OK with you, Dan?’

‘Sure.’

They went up to the training suite and Janet looked round in amazement. It looked like the command centre of a starship. In the centre of the room was a long sweeping control console curving round a high-backed leather chair. The console looked like a huge sheet of glass, under which lamps twinkled and images of control areas flickered. Facing the chair were several computer screens, and the wall beyond was almost entirely made up of other screens, larger than the ones on the desk. She looked amazed as Kirkland explained the computer screens’ messages, graphs, bar-graphs and mimic diagrams of the plant.

‘Gosh!’ she breathed. ‘How can anybody take all this in?’

Dan laughed. ‘They get used to it.’

‘The most important one for us,’ Kirkland said, pointing to a large digital number on the centre screen, ‘is that one. It shows how much electricity the whole plant’s producing.’

He turned to Foster and said, ‘It’s all ready for you, Dan. I’ll take Janet off and leave you to it.’

‘That’s fine, Bill. It’ll take me a while to get round it all.’ Then, as an afterthought, he asked, ‘Oh, Bill. Did you get a package in the mail? Marked for my attention?’

‘Yes, I did,’ Kirkland replied. ‘It’s on the right, there.’

Foster leaned across and picked up the envelope. As he opened it he winked at Janet. ‘A precaution,’ he said. ‘That day we went shopping in Estes Park I mailed another copy of the disk to Alex Cooper. Asked him to send it to Bill here. Just in case they intercepted mail going to my
place, or Grant’s.’

She shook her head and smiled. ‘You’re a devious old bugger,’ she said admiringly.

‘Not so much of the old!’

With that brief exchange over, Kirkland took her away to start her tour of the plant.

Foster took another look round and started to work. Soon his fingers were flying across the console and the computer screens were responding.

He was simulating a start up of the massive plant outside.

When Kirkland reappeared with Janet, Foster was sitting back in the chair looking at the screens with a thoughtful expression on his face. At their entry he swivelled the chair and asked her if it had been interesting.

‘Amazing,’ she said. ‘Those huge machines, the noise, the heat. I’ll never turn on a light again without thinking about this.’

‘Good,’ Foster smiled. ‘One convert down, sixty million to go.’

‘What surprised me was how clean everything was,’ she said. ‘I saw the coal being handled and the things that grind it to powder….’

‘The mills,’ Foster said.

‘Yes. But everything’s spotless.’

Kirkland looked at his watch and cut short her praises. ‘I’ve arranged lunch for twelve-thirty,’ he said. ‘We should go. You can tell me what you’ve found while we eat, Dan.’

They went down to the power stations’ light and airy canteen and took their places in an area where a waitress brought them menus.

Janet asked, ‘Does everybody eat here?’

‘Mostly,’ Kirkland said. ‘It’s very egalitarian here. Everybody has a choice: self-service or waitress service; you pays your money and you takes your choice.’

‘This menu looks impressive,’ Janet commented. ‘Is it as good as it sounds?’

‘It’s pretty good,’ Kirkland answered. ‘Some days better than others. Not many people complain. Sorry, but there’s no booze on offer: only water or fruit juice. If it’s not safe to drink and drive it certainly isn’t safe to drink and work with all this machinery around.’

They made their selections and when the waitress had left Kirkland asked what Foster had found.

‘Interesting,’ he replied. ‘It took me most of the time to get round to understanding it, but I think I’m there now.’

‘Have you found out anything about the shutdown?’ Kirkland asked.

‘Not yet. But I’d like to try an experiment, Bill.’

‘Experiment?’

‘Yes. That package you gave me: it’s a disk with some software. I had a quick look and I think I can see what might have happened. But I need to trigger it off.’

‘How’ll you do that?’ Kirkland asked.

‘I need to connect my laptop into the system. Just the simulator, that is. Will that be OK with you?’

Kirkland thought for a moment before answering. ‘I guess so.’

‘It’s only software isn’t it?’ Foster asked. ‘No I/O cards?’

He was worried that the original shut down had been accompanied by the destruction of the Input/Output devices that connected the computer to the plant.

‘No hardware,’ Kirkland confirmed. ‘The plant’s a computer model, linked to the simulator.’

‘But the simulator’s an exact copy of the ones on the plant?’

Kirkland nodded and Foster said, ‘I’ll hook into the system and try to replicate what our hacker did. Then we’ll see what happens.’

After he had plugged his laptop into the simulator he explained what he was about to do. ‘The simulator’s an exact replica of the plant out there, running pretty well flat out. When we’re ready I’ll try to repeat what young Luke did.’

He drew Janet’s attention to the large digital display at the centre of the console. ‘That says we’re generating almost six hundred and fifty megawatts,’ he explained. ‘That’s thousands of kilowatts. Or at least we’re pretending to, it’s all simulated.’

Then he turned to Kirkland. ‘I’m about to do what the boy did,’ he said. ‘You OK with that, Bill?

‘OK.’ Kirkland’s face showed a flicker of concern as he replied. But he trusted his colleague implicitly. And it was just a simulator, after all.

Foster took a deep breath and looked down at the laptop. ‘Here goes then!’ he said, and tapped at the keyboard.

For a few seconds nothing happened.

Then a single, stark message appeared on the central screen:

And with that, the message abruptly disappeared. Everything suddenly went berserk. The displays on the screens began to change violently, red alarm messages began to flash urgently everywhere. Then, while they watched, the displays gradually settled down.

But they had all changed; the graphs began to tilt downwards and the digital indicator on the central screen began to decrement. At the beginning it had displayed 648 MW, now the number was rapidly dropping – 600, 580, 520….

‘It’s shutting down!’ Kirkland exclaimed. ‘Fast!’

And indeed, within the space of a few minutes everything steadied out.

The central display read ‘O MW’.

Kirkland turned to Foster, shook his head slowly and said, ‘That’s exactly what happened in the summer.’ His voice was very quiet.

‘I guessed so,’ Foster said. ‘Did you have that message about a Darkfall Switch then?’

‘One of the operators said he’d seen a funny message, but it came and went so quickly that he didn’t have time to read it properly. And with everything shutting down round him, he had his work cut out trying to do something about it.’

Janet looked from one man to the other. ‘What did you do?’ she asked Foster.

‘I copied what Luke Proctor did,’ Foster replied. There was ice in his voice as he said, ‘But whereas he had to work his way in and figure out how to trigger it off, I had it all handed to me. On that disk.’

Grant shook his head as if he was unwilling to believe what he was hearing. Foster had told him what he’d discovered and now he could begin to see the full implications. Suddenly, the enormity of what he had been told hit him. It wasn’t just a matter of a couple of local power stations being vulnerable to attack: it was most of the ones in the UK – and hundreds of others around the world.

‘Good God, man,’ he whispered. ‘It’s frightening.’

‘Yes,’ Foster replied, ‘it is. But what really amazes me is that a company like Powerplant Dynamics could release a system with this type of vulnerability.’

‘So that any hacker could break in and cripple the power stations.’

‘Exactly. They told me that the Darkfall Switch was a remote diagnostics system, allowing them to check on performance. But then why does it shut down the plant? It does that very effectively. If Luke had just managed to hook into a diagnostic system from his home computer he wouldn’t have done any harm.’

‘But we all know that he brought down the plants,’ Grant said. There was a puzzled look on his face.

‘Yes,’ Foster said. ‘My first guess was that the company had made a simple boner, and that the diagnostics accidentally triggered a safety shutdown – that somehow the two functions had got entangled: when the diagnostics are run, the plant shuts down. But that’s a hell of a mistake. It’s like the doctor asking a patient to stick out his tongue and
say “Ah”, and then stabbing him!’

Grant gave a grim smile. ‘But you said your first guess was that it was a boner,’ he asked, pronouncing the last word as if he found it distasteful. ‘A mistake. Do you think it’s more than that? That it was intentional?’

Foster shook his head. ‘I can’t be sure.’

‘But what makes you suspicious’ Grant asked.

Foster marshalled his thoughts carefully before replying. ‘First, the Darkfall Switch is very well hidden. Why should anybody hide something innocent? Second, when it’s evoked it erases itself, leaving no trace behind.
When it’s created all that havoc, it obliterates itself
.’

‘So that’s why our experts couldnae find it!’ Grant exclaimed.

‘Yes. The Darkfall Switch is strictly a one-time routine. Use it once and it’s gone, leaving mayhem in its wake.’ He paused before adding, ‘And then there’s the fact that it destroys some of the computer hardware when it runs.’

Grant shook his head in disbelief. ‘Why would anybody want tae do that?’ he asked.

‘Don’t know. But there’re signs of panic and cover-up in Denver. PPD are very inconsistent about the explanation. First, they told the MD of their British operation that they’d been mishandled by somebody here. Then Zak Beckermann suggested to me that they’d been damaged as a result of a power surge initiated by the shutdown. But from what I saw on the simulator that’s a load of bull. It’s a deliberate feature of the system: it’s designed to damage the cards.’

‘You’re sure?’

‘Definitely.’

‘But why?’

‘I don’t know. All I know is that the whole thing smells. Then, on top of it all, remember that PPD denied they even had a safety shutdown routine. It now looks like they were lying.’

Grant shook his head again. Then he gathered his thoughts and asked, ‘Anything else?’

‘Yes. The big one: why would anyone go to such extraordinary lengths to cover up the existence of the switch? Like resorting to murder.’

‘Yes,’ Grant agreed, ‘what kind of engineering company would do that? Companies dinna resort to murder to protect their trade secrets.’

‘I’m not sure that the company had anything to do with it,’ Foster said.

Grant frowned. ‘You suspect that it could be whoever was behind this secret team that was brought in?’

‘Yes. And there are a lot of open questions about them too. Who brought them in? Why? And who was paying them? Matthews said they were very highly qualified and experienced people: and experts like that don’t come cheap.’

Grant frowned. ‘You said they had been involved with pricing the systems?’

‘Matthews said they enabled PPD to set such low prices that they effectively undercut all their competitors. But the staff would still have to be paid and the raw materials would still have to be bought in at the going market rate – everything from the chips to the steel cabinets. Somebody had to bankroll all of that, and I doubt that any commercial company could afford it.’

Grant stared at him in amazement. ‘Are you saying that you suspect the American
Government
of secretly subsidizing the company’s sales efforts?’

Foster thought about it. The situation had uncomfortable resonances with his earlier investigation into the Chinese plant.

‘It’s possible,’ he said finally. ‘Governments naturally want to help their exporters; but any whiff of a subsidy can create serious repercussions. Look at what happened a while ago: the Boeing/Airbus row. The Americans accused the Europeans of paying anti-competitive subsidies, and the Europeans accused the Americans of doing the same thing.’

‘I see,’ Grant said. ‘So placing a development contract with the company would be a secret subsidy?’

‘Exactly! A big enough so-called “development contract” would bankroll their sales. Give them a valuable entrée. Later on, when they’d become properly established and respected, they could raise their prices to more realistic levels. By then American industry would have wiped out all competition.’

‘So that’s why the secret team got involved with the commercial side.’

‘Yup. They would need to balance the cost of subsidizing the sales against the payback. They must have had access to a lot of very useful trade information, because they needed to undercut the competition by
only just enough to win the contract without raising any suspicions. And that process had to be carefully matched to each contract.’

Grant thought a long time and then asked, ‘And what about that laddie blacking out London?’

‘That was due to a very unfortunate set of mishaps: the diagnostic routine initiating a shut-down is one, but the boy tapping into it was another. He just sprung the trap that they’d inadvertently set.’

Grant stared at him, then stood and looked thoughtfully out of the window. ‘And when they found out they resorted to murder to conceal it?’

‘There would certainly be a big temptation to cover it all up. Getting an American company established in an important world market is one thing; discovering that you’ve made their customers vulnerable to attack – to cyber terrorism – is another entirely. Then, to cap it all, having that combination of weaknesses black out a friendly country and in the process kill dozens of people…. That raises the stakes high enough to perhaps tempt somebody into taking extreme measures to cover it up.’

‘Aye,’ Grant agreed, with a shrug of reluctance. ‘I suppose so, but what you’re saying is that somebody brought in an assassin. Surely not. Once upon a time maybe, but governments have to be very careful these days.’

‘Then who’s Worzniak?’ Foster asked. ‘Who does he work for? Why did he disappear when you started asking questions about him?’

Grant returned to studying the London landscape outside his window. Finally he said, ‘Very well. I’ll report all of this to my principals. They can look into it further. They have the resources.’

‘So I’ve done my job?’

‘Aye. I think so. There are still some bits and pieces to be resolved so we’ll no doubt be asking you more questions. But you’ve found out what happened so, aye, thank you. As usual, very well done.’

But, just as Foster pushed back his chair to leave, the telephone rang. Grant picked up the handset. At first he’d been looking out of the window as he listened, but after a few moments he turned to Foster and held up his hand, signalling that he should stay.

When the call ended, Grant sat down and stared at him, an expression of reluctant disbelief in his eyes.

‘Our friend’s back,’ he said eventually.

There was only one possible candidate. ‘Who? Joe Worzniak?’

‘Aye.’ Grant shook his head slowly, as if unable to believe what he’d just heard. ‘You remember me telling you that he’d been removed from office? Well, now it seems that – somehow – he’s been reinstated.’

Foster shrugged. ‘So that wily bastard’s back,’ he said. ‘But how does that affect me?’

‘That was Sir James,’ Grant said. ‘He’s on his way over here. He wants to talk to you.’

Grant’s secretary ushered Sir James Ballantyne into the room and he strode across to Foster, smiling and holding out his hand. ‘Doctor Foster,’ he said. ‘It’s good to see you again. I’ve been hearing reports of your work—’

Grant interrupted. ‘Doctor Foster has discovered a wee bit more, Sir James.’ He sketched out the information that Foster had just given him.

When he finished, Sir James said, ‘I see. And you think that somebody resorted to murder to cover up all of this?’

‘I wish I could think of any other explanation for all the things that’ve been happening round this thing, but I can’t.’

Ballantyne stared at him solemnly for a moment. Then he said, ‘There’s something you should know. As soon as we found out what was happening, we persuaded the Americans to clamp down on this fellow Worzniak.’

‘Yes,’ Foster nodded, ‘Mr Grant told me. But he says he’s come back now.’

‘Yes,’ Ballantyne affirmed. ‘Originally we thought he was just making life difficult for you – for us. We didn’t dream that he might try to kill you. Not at the time.’

Foster gave an icy grin. ‘I wouldn’t have believed it myself! He looked the all-American boy, not like what I expect a murderer to be.’

‘Quite. Anyway, when we asked the Americans they were pretty cagey about him and what he was doing, but in the end they did agree to withdraw him from the scene.’

‘Mr Grant told me you’d spoken to the Americans,’ Foster continued, ‘and they’d pulled Worzniak off. And that, as much as anything, convinced me that he was behind it all. Because, after you’d spoken to them, there were no further attempts to get rid of me.’

Ballantyne pursed his lips. ‘And now he’s back.’

Foster took a deep breath. ‘I just hope he keeps away from me,’ he
said bitterly. ‘But, anyway, I don’t see how it affects me. I’ve finished my work. Mr Grant and I were just agreeing to end this investigation when you rang.’

‘Yes,’ Ballantyne confirmed, but there was hesitation in his voice. ‘Yes indeed, the original investigation has ended. Thanks to you, we now know about the Darkfall Switch and we can take the necessary action.’

‘That’s it then.’

‘Not quite,’ Ballantyne said, his voice almost sad. ‘You see, we’d like you to do a little more for us.’

Foster leaned back in his chair. ‘What’s that?’ he asked eventually.

‘There are still a lot of open questions about the technical background. In particular, all we have right now is your word for it. If we’re going to take this to a higher level we’re going to need something more. Hard evidence. We need your particular expertise to tie up all the loose ends. It shouldn’t take more than a couple of days.’

Foster gritted his teeth and contemplated the prospect. Then he nodded reluctantly. ‘All right, I’m ready to do a bit more. But what do you want?’

‘Proof. Or an admission of guilt at least.’

‘I don’t see that we’ll get that. If you want hard evidence that there’s been a hidden subsidy by the American Government we’d need to look at all the commercial paperwork and we’d need a Court Order.’

‘Yes, and for that we’d have to involve the same people who, if you’re right, originally organized the subsidy.’

‘Exactly! And there’s no way of finding hard evidence on the Darkfall Switch: what it is and what it does. It’s a piece of software – probably blown away by now, all traces of it erased.’

Ballantyne looked bleak. ‘Then, if we can’t get proof,’ he pleaded ‘What about a confession?’

‘From Beckermann, the head honcho?’

‘Yes.’

Foster looked thoughtful. ‘I suppose it’s a possibility,’ he admitted, ‘if we put the wind up him: if we convinced him that he was involved in dozens of deaths – the original accident and then the murders.’

‘Do you think you could get Beckermann to confirm all you’ve just told me? With your technical knowledge you should be able to convince him that there’s no way of ducking the issue. And you’d be able to pick holes in any smokescreen that he puts up.’

Foster nodded slowly. ‘I could give it a try.’

Ballantyne gave him a wintry smile and said, ‘But this time, when you go back to America, I’m coming with you.’

Foster was sitting with Janet in the bistro in Esher. They had finished eating and were sipping their coffee. As he told her about his meeting with Forsyth and Ballantyne she leaned back in her chair, worry showing in her face.

‘So you’re going back to Denver,’ she sighed and, when he nodded she added, ‘With Joe Worzniak on the loose.’

‘Yes.’

‘I don’t like it, Dan,’ she exclaimed. ‘He tried to kill you before. Won’t he try again?’

‘I doubt it. You see, this time Sir James is coming with me. And only a madman would try to commit murder with a high-profile British official in attendance. And especially when he knows he’s under scrutiny.’

‘I’m not so sure that he isn’t that,’ she said. ‘A madman, I mean.’

Foster grinned.