The Illuminati (53 page)

Rutland had another piece of disturbing news from his informant on General Abbott's staff. The joint chiefs were aware of the camps and knew about the atomic device that would be used to destroy the camp in Arizona as a test. Now that the military was alerted, he knew they would have to move quickly or risk facing well-armed and disciplined foes within the military. Stopping them wouldn't be like rounding up the Christian “sheep.”

Rutland was torn between telling Razzak or dealing with the generals himself. Normally he would have gone directly to the Leader, but he was concerned that an overt act against the military leaders would spark a revolt in the Armed Services. They were nowhere ready to face that tiger yet.
It is better not to tell the Leader
, he decided.
When the group meets again, we will arrest the traitors
.

He knew he would need evidence, real or contrived, to convince the public. He would call Marla West; her agents would be needed if Gorman and his group were to be rounded up.

His concentration was interrupted by the electronic beep of his private line. “Mr. Rutland, we have a problem with Data-Net,” Dr. Loo said.

“What is it?” Rutland growled into the phone.

“I would suggest you come down immediately,” Loo responded coolly. “It is critical.”

Rutland slammed the door to his office so hard when he left that the receptionist jumped, knocking the phone off of the desk. She knew he was headed to the basement area and would be gone several minutes at a minimum. She hurried into his vacated office and carefully exchanged his pen set with an identical set containing a sensitive listening device. She tried to be as careful as possible not to leave any sign that she had been there. She was terrified of Rutland, but the information she had received the day before convinced her she had to help the group opposing the administration. Her sister and brother-in-law had been arrested and taken away, just because they had been hiding the daughter of a friend in their home.

“What is it?” Rutland shouted at Loo, as he stormed into his office.

Loo did not even seem to notice Rutland's manner. “We have a problem,” he replied unemotionally. “Look at this.” He shoved a large pile of printouts toward Rutland.

Rutland shoved them back angrily. “Just tell me the bottom line! What's wrong?”

Loo shuffled the papers into neat stacks before he answered. “Apparently something in one of the subroutines has been altered. The trains scheduled to pick up the detainees have been rerouted to remote locations around the country.”

“What!”Rutland shouted. He knew the effect this information would have on Razzak. “Can you straighten it out?”

“Yes,” Loo replied without further comment.

“How long?”

“A day, perhaps; two at the most. But it will take another several days to reroute the trains to their original destinations.”

Rutland knew that the temporary detention centers must be overflowing by now. Without the trains they would have to stop the arrests or risk attracting the media's attention. “Do it!” Rutland commanded as he got up to leave. He was beginning to hate the Asian scientist who seemed indifferent to their problems.

Just as Rutland was about to walk out, Dr. Loo said, “You have an even bigger problem, Mr. Rutland.”

“What now?” Rutland growled at Loo, who still had his back to him.

“These errors are the result of Mr.Wells' actions.”

“What?!?” Rutland snapped, stopping where he was. “That's impossible. Wells is dead. He died in a plane crash.”

“He is the only person capable of making changes to the operating system. I can only make minor changes to his system. It is true genius,” Loo said admiringly. “I still do not fully understand its interactive nature. It is almost human in its ability to reprogram itself.”

“You must be wrong!” Rutland argued, his frustrations obvious. “How do you know it's not just a flaw in your program?”

“Because I personally routed another train to one of the original locations. The system then selectively rerouted it to the most remote location possible. No, Mr. Rutland, this is not a system failure; it is a deliberate attempt to slow your detention down.”

Rutland felt like his head was going to explode.
How could Wells be alive? It had to be Shepperd! He must have done a double switch if Wells wasn't on that plane they shot down. That stupid Lively!
he thought to himself.
If he weren't dead, I'd have him killed!

“What can you do to keep Wells out of the system?” he asked the much smaller man. Dr. Loo was not intimated by Rutland's implied threat.

“Nothing,” he answered. “Absolutely nothing. That young man is the Michelangelo of computers. If he wants into the system, he can get in. Apparently he has built-in access codes that allow him to address the compiler directly. I really would like to know how he did it. The system never logs him in or out, and the system clock never shows his time use.”

“Can we turn the system off?” Rutland asked in frustration.

“Yes, if you're willing to shut down the U.S. and European economies. We are totally committed to Data-Net for all transactions, including Mr.Wells' expenditures.”

Rutland stormed out of Loo's office and headed directly to his own office, where he made the call to Razzak. The secretary said he was in a meeting with President Alton. Rutland didn't even bother to buzz the president's office. He just walked over and announced to her secretary that he was going in. The flustered secretary was buzzing the president when Rutland opened the door.

“What is the meaning of this?” Razzak demanded as Rutland entered.

“I'm sorry, sir, but we have serious problems, and I knew you and the president would want to know immediately.”

“Speak,” Razzak said more softly.

“Wells is still alive. He has entered the system and rerouted all of our trains.”

“How is this possible?” Razzak screamed in a voice that was somehow not his own. “You said Wells was killed on the plane.”

“Apparently Shepperd tricked our men into believing he was on that plane. Dr. Loo is positive that Wells is using the Data-Net system even now.”

“Shut the system down!” Razzak commanded Rutland. “He will wreck our plans.”

“If we do that, sir, we will collapse the economies of our friends and make ourselves the laughing stock of the world.”

“You are correct,” Razzak said, taking a seat and glancing toward Kathy Alton. She appeared unflustered. What Razzak didn't know was that Kathy Alton was reinforcing her calm with increasing doses of a white powder.

“What is your suggestion?” Razzak asked.

Rutland was somewhat surprised by the question. He was used to making decisions, but not when Razzak was around.

“I believe they are hiding in the Atlanta area,” Rutland said emphatically. “That is where the police last saw Elder and Shepperd. We can reasonably assume that Wells is somewhere in that vicinity also. I suggest that we pull several thousand of our best agents into the area and search every house if we have to. We have no idea what Wells has in mind for Data-Net.

I suspect he already has found a way to defeat our new ID system.”

“Is that possible?” Razzak asked sharply. “I thought Dr. Loo said it was undefeatable.” Only Razzak himself knew that the next step in the ID system was the inclusion of another number in the code. This number would be given only to those who swore allegiance to the Great Leader. Eventually all others would be prohibited from the system. Then, and only then, would the system be complete.

“Dr. Loo says Wells is capable of defeating it. Wells programmed in codes that allow him access to the main program from outside.”

“Your suggestion to ferret him out is excellent,” Razzak said, without visible emotion. “See that it is done.”

“I would like to oversee the search myself, if you will allow me.”

“Another excellent suggestion. Have the document drawn up, and the president will authorize it.”

Kathy Alton acknowledged the “suggestion” by a nod of her head.

28

C
OUNTERATTACK

Jeff Wells was hunched over his portable terminal, busily working inside the Data-Net program, establishing lines of credit for the five or six million families that John Elder estimated had been purged from the system. He checked his credit accumulator and found that it had developed a $20-billion surplus already. “Boy, it would be fun to spend that much money,” Jeff said teasingly to Karen. “The Congress had to be pretty creative to spend that much every day, huh?”

“A senator from the 1970s once commented, ‘A billion here, a billion there, and you're talking about some real money.' Are you sure all these transfers won't be traceable?” she asked as she saw the account files being assembled.

“Positive,” he said, grinning. “My program is kind of like an Indian who walks backward and brushes away his tracks behind him.”

“Just be sure you don't bump into a bear while you're walking backward,” she said as she hugged him.

“Hello.What is this?” Jeff said as his screen flashed.

“What
is
that?” Karen asked, as she too noticed the flashing symbol.

“I put in a special feature a couple of days ago. Wanted to keep track of our friends at the White House, so I flagged their accounts to flash whenever they were used. President Alton's account was just opened.”

“There's nothing unusual about that,” Karen commented as Jeff punched the keys. “She probably has to pay bills like everyone else.”

“Except that her account was accessed from Cal Rutland's terminal,”he said as the file began to print out.“He has been authorized to use a Defense Department jet tomorrow. Let's see where he's landing.”Wells punched up the access code for Andrews Air Force Base and checked the flight plan schedule.“Here it is. The flight plan is from Washington to Atlanta.”

Karen looked puzzled. “Rutland is coming to Atlanta? I wonder why?”

“I don't know,” Jeff responded. “But we'd better let Shepperd know.”

Karen went out to find the agent who was working with Elder, planning trips to other cities. “Don, you'd better come and take a look. Jeff has found something peculiar.”

Wells quickly filled the agent in on what he had found. “Could be a normal business trip,” Shepperd said, “but of course I don't believe it for a minute. If Rutland, Razzak's main man, is leaving Washington, it's serious business. And since we're near Atlanta, I suspect we're part of it. Can you dig up anything else, Jeff?”

“I'll try,” Jeff responded, calling up the other White House access codes. “Look at this!”Wells shouted as the filed appeared.

“What is all that?” Shepperd asked as the file filled the screen and scrolled past.

“These are all transactions made through the attorney general's account today. They're airline reservations, from all over the country.”

“Check the destinations,” Shepperd said hurriedly. The hair was tingling on the back of his neck. Something was definitely up.

Jeff instructed the program to verify destinations of the tickets purchased. The first twenty to fill the screen told the whole story: Atlanta, Georgia.

“They're bringing in agents from around the country,” Shepperd warned. “They're going to do a house-to-house search for us! Eventually they'll pick up our trail. We need to warn the others and then clear out— fast!”

“Just a minute,” Jeff said calmly. “We've been on the run since the beginning. If we move, I may have a problem finding another mechanical phone relay system.”

“The next closest one is in Mississippi,” Shepperd said.

“And what about the risk of moving all of our people and supplies so quickly?” Elder said as he walked into the room from the porch, where he had been listening.

“What choice do we have?” Shepperd growled. “These are professionals. They will eventually locate this place.”

“Why don't we scatter the troops?” Jeff said with a smirk on his face.

“What are you up to now?” Karen asked Jeff, who was grinning like a Cheshire cat.

“One thing about a totally cash-less system,” Jeff said as he typed in more instructions, “is that it can work for either side. And we're on the controlling side now.”He continued to type for several minutes before he halted.

“I have just canceled their reservations,” he said triumphantly. “I also invalidated all the codes in the attorney general's office. Basically the government is locked out of Data-Net.”

“For how long?” Shepperd asked.

“It will probably take Dr. Loo and his team a day or two to figure out how to overcome the problem. I also instructed the system to override all flights to Atlanta. As of tomorrow at 4:00 A.M. the city of Atlanta has been removed from all flight reservations computers around the country. Oh yes, also at 6:00 A.M. the main computer at the Atlanta airport will shut down, wiping all of its memory banks when it does. The airport will be closed for a couple of days.”