Intervention: A Science Fiction Adventure (14 page)

Now it was time to get
to work.

Christopher went
straight to Bill’s office, passing through security in the lobby
and proudly wearing his newly acquired identification badge. As he
exited the elevator on the fourth floor, he saw Barb sitting at her
desk busily working away on her typewriter. She stopped and looked
up. “Good morning, Christopher, I mean Mr. Adams.”

“No, no,
Christopher’s fine.”

Barb acknowledged,
“Christopher, you can go right in. Bill’s expecting you.”

“Thank you, Barb.”
Christopher proceeded to Bill’s office and entered to find Bill
just concluding a phone call. Bill motioned for Christopher to come
in.

“Okay, thanks, Bob.
I’ll get back to you as soon as I hear anything. Right. Bye.”
Bill set the receiver back in its cradle. “Good morning,
Christopher.”

“Good morning,”
Christopher responded.

“Come on. I’ll show
you your office.” Bill led Christopher out the door and down the
hall. “You’ll be right down the hall from me. Ah, here we are.”
As they entered the office, Bill continued, “Well, what do you
think?” Bill asked.

“It’s very nice.”

“I’m glad you like
it, because you’ll be spending a lot of time here. I’ve asked Tom
Clayton, he’s our resident computer expert in charge of Mega Bucks,
to come up to see you. He’ll set up a password for you and give you
a basic rundown on how the system’s programming is set up. He
should be by in twenty minutes or so. In the meantime, you can start
familiarizing yourself with this darn Russian code we’re working
on.”

Bill hit a couple of
keys on the computer terminal on Christopher’s desk. “First
you’ll need to set up your own password and delete the one I used
to access the program just now. Then just pull up the file named
‘Helix,’ and you’ll be there. If you need anything, just pick
up the phone and press seven to get Barb. Press one for me and nine
for an outside line or zero for an operator. I have got to get back
to my office, so if you don’t have any questions, I’ll leave you
to get started.”

“Thanks Bill. I’ll
be fine,” Christopher responded as Bill left him to explore his new
surroundings.

Christopher sat for a
moment, taking everything in. His new office was very nice, and it
was equipped with everything he would need. After a few moments,
Christopher turned to his computer terminal and put in his personal
password. Then, as instructed, he deleted the password Bill had used.
He returned to the main menu, found the file named “Helix” and
punched it up. He must have been looking at it for some time, when he
heard a knock, looked up and saw Tom Clayton standing in the doorway
of his office.

“I’m sorry, come
in, Tom. I was just taking a look at this Helix code. Please, sit
down.”

“Thank you,” Tom
said as he sat in one of the chairs in front of Christopher’s desk,
then continued, “That’s one bugger of a code. My expertise is in
programming and overseeing the computer system, but I am, of course,
familiar with all of the decryption techniques used by the agency.
Now that you’ve had a chance to look at the Helix, what do you
think?”

Christopher looked from
Tom to the computer screen, then remarked, “It’s very
interesting.”

“That’s an
understatement. Let’s take a walk to the computer room and I’ll
show you just what it is we’re doing with Mega Bucks.”

Tom and Christopher
walked to the far end of the fourth floor to the door accessing Mega
Bucks. After Tom performed the ritual of unlocking the door, he and
Christopher went into Tom’s office located in the rear of the
computer room.

“Have a seat,” Tom
told Christopher. Tom sat behind his desk and entered his password
giving him access into the system. “First let’s get you access to
the computer room. There, now all you have to do is come back here
and enter in a five digit number then hit save and it will clear the
screen. You will be the only one who knows your code, so even if
someone were to get hold of your ID card, they still couldn’t
access Mega Bucks.”

Tom got up from behind
his desk and walked to the other side to allow Christopher privacy to
enter his code. “All done,” Christopher said as he returned to
the seat in front of the desk.

Tom returned to his
seat and continued, “Everything we do concerning Mega Bucks can be
accessed right from the terminal on your desk. I mean
everything
—the
program currently running, the status of that program, program
formats, even basic programming instructions. Most of the decryption
programs are written so you can just input the parameters, select the
subroutines you want from the list, and it does the rest. It’s sort
of a fill-in-the-blanks program.

“Do you have any
objections to my writing my own programs?” Christopher inquired.

“Not at all,” Tom
answered. “I do, however, have to review any new programs before
they are run, but otherwise, you are free to write anything you think
might help. When you get back to your office, just bring up the file
named ‘Mega Bucks.’ You’ll find everything you need there. If
you have any questions, just give me a call at extension twelve.”

“Thank you, Tom,”
Christopher replied. “I’ll see you soon.”

Christopher returned to
his office and began familiarizing himself with all the programs and
their subroutines and parameters. He then checked on the progress
Mega Bucks had made on the Helix code. The computer wasn’t having
much luck. He decided to try to write a new program with a little
different approach. Christopher felt the key to decrypting the code
might lie within the messages themselves.

For the next several
months, he tried several approaches with no results. Christopher
always saw an unsuccessful attempt not as a failure but as a
possibility eliminated, narrowing the field of options, and thus
bringing him closer to the correct answer. He had blown up
photographs of several of the messages exactly as they were received
hanging on the wall in front of his desk, always in view. He always
brought his lunch to his office so he could look at the photographs
even while he ate, instead of eating in the cafeteria with his
co-workers. He just had a feeling the key was in the messages
themselves. He had learned through experience that his intuition was
almost always right, so he continued along these lines.

This went on day after
day, month after month. Christopher would look at the enlarged
photographs sometimes for hours on end. He knew the answer was right
in front of him, but he just wasn’t seeing it. What could he be
missing? There was nothing there but the lines of jumbled letters.
There was nothing else on the photographs, except, of course, the
date.
The date!

Christopher immediately
began hitting the keys on his computer. In a matter of moments, the
printer came to life spitting out page after page of encrypted
messages intercepted over the last three years. There was one big
difference this time: All the messages were sorted according to the
date they were sent. He took all of those sent on the same date and
looked at them for anything they might have in common. It wasn’t
long before he was able to find certain similarities in all the
messages sent on the same date.
Bingo!
He found several words that matched. He knew there would always be
certain words used several times in every message. The Russian
equivalent of words like “the” and “for” and so on. Now that
he knew for a fact that the date was the key, he went to work on a
new program that would allow Mega Bucks to earn its pricey nickname.

Christopher was busily
working away at his computer terminal when he heard a noise and
looked up to see Bill standing in his doorway. “Have you got a
minute?” he asked.

Christopher stopped and
responded, “Sure, Bill. Please, sit down.”

Bill sat in one of the
seats in front of Christopher’s desk. “I’ve noticed you’re
pace has suddenly picked up, and you’re working till all hours of
the night. Are you on to something I should know about?”

“Well,” Christopher
responded, “I guess I’m sure enough to tell you about it. I think
I cracked Helix. Well, I haven’t got it completely, but I found the
key. It’s the date. I found that the messages are encrypted
according to the date they were sent. The person receiving the
message then uses the date as the key code for the decryption.”
Christopher stood up and walked over to where several of the enlarged
photographs were hanging on his wall. Pointing to highlighted areas
of the different messages, he continued, “For example, all of these
messages were intercepted on the same date. Some in different years,
but the exact same day of the year. I then looked for two and three
letter words, like ‘the’ and ‘for’—words that would be
common to almost every message. You can see the words I highlighted
in each message,” Christopher pointed to different words, “here
and here—a perfect match. Again here and here, and here—perfect
match again. There’s no doubt that the date is the key to
decrypting the messages, I just haven’t got all the details worked
out yet.”

Bill sat and looked at
the photographs for a moment. Then he turned to Christopher. “That’s
amazing. You’ve found the key. Have you run it through Mega Bucks
yet?”

“I’m just putting
the finishing touches on a program I’m writing based on the date
being the key code. As soon as Tom clears the program, we’ll run it
and see what happens.”

Bill stood up, “As
soon as your program is ready to run, come down to the computer room.
I’m going there now and I will have Tom get ready to run it as soon
as you’re ready.”

“I should be there in
ten, maybe fifteen minutes,” Christopher responded.

As Christopher entered
Bill’s office, he found both Bill and Tom staring at the computer
screen on Tom’s desk. “How’s it look Tom?” Christopher asked.

“This is really
something, Christopher. Some of these subroutines are quite unusual,
but I don’t see any problem with running it. I’ll start loading
it, and as soon as it is in, we can turn it loose on Helix and see
what it does.” Bill stroked the keys on his terminal for another
minute or so, then said, “All right. It’s uploading into the
mainframe. Let’s go out to the main console and as soon as it’s
finished downloading, we’ll give it a whirl.”

Tom, Bill, and
Christopher all left Tom’s office and went to a large control
console in the middle of the computer room. Tom sat at the console
flanked by Bill and Christopher. “There. That’s it. Okay, let’s
do it.” Tom, having brought up the new program, hit the run button
brining Mega Bucks to life. Tape reels were spinning, lights were
flashing—it was a computation ballet of sorts. After a moment of
observation, Tom broke the silence. “Well, all we can do now is
wait. It will probably take quite a while.”

“Have either of you
had lunch yet?” Bill asked.

“Well, actually no,”
Christopher responded.

“Not me,” Tom
answered.

“Come on then. I’ll
buy you both lunch in the cafeteria, and Christopher, how about we
eat it there, too?” Bill said jokingly.

After lunch, the three
returned to the computer room to see what, if any, progress Mega
Bucks had made on the Helix decryption. “This could take hours,
maybe more,” Tom stated.

“Let me know as soon
as anything breaks, Tom. I’ll be in my office,” Bill stated and
left the room.

Christopher said, “I’ll
monitor progress from my office terminal. I want to go over the
program and see if I can improve it in some way. I’ll talk to you
later, Tom.”

As Christopher
approached the door to leave, Tom added, “By the way, Christopher,
good work.”

Back in his office,
Christopher brought up a program that enabled him to monitor any
progress made by Mega Bucks. He then poured over a printout of the
program he had written, looking for ways to improve it.

It was almost one in
the morning. He stayed a little later than usual having been
monitoring the progress of Mega Bucks, and suspected it was on the
verge of a breakthrough.

The cleaning people had
already come through and cleaned and vacuumed. He was sitting back in
his chair going over the program in his mind, when he noticed
something different on his computer monitor. Something was flashing.
Christopher immediately sat up in his chair and read the message
contained in the flashing rectangular border. It read, “Task
complete: press F1 to view message.” As fast as Christopher could
press the designated key, he began to read what was once an encrypted
message.

“Oh no!” he said
out loud. He quickly started flipping through his rolodex. “Bill?
It’s Christopher. I’m sorry to wake you, but I think you had
better get down here as quick as you can. You better give Agent
Johnson a call, too. He needs to know this now!”

“I’ll call him and
be right there,” Bill replied still half asleep.

Bill and Agent Johnson
arrived at the same time at Christopher’s office. Bill asked, “What
have you got Christopher?”

“Well, Mega Bucks
broke the code about one o’clock this morning. As you know, Bill,
we were using older messages with the program to test the program.
After Mega Bucks successfully decoded those, I decided to double
check the program by feeding in some more recently intercepted
messages. This is what I got,” Christopher handed Agent Johnson and
Bill each a copy of the decoded message.

The message was
instructing the KGB to move on a recently discovered American agent
acting as a double agent, while all the time feeding the important
information back to the Americans.

“We’ve only got a
couple of hours before they pick him up. I’m going down to
communications and get a warning off to him to disappear. Good work,
Christopher.” Agent Johnson left in a hurry.