Calypso Directive (24 page)

“Yes,” VanCleave replied, “Unless, of course, the server room is locked.”

“And if the server room is locked?”

“Hold out your hand,” VanCleave said.

AJ extended his hand, and VanCleave dropped in his open palm three, slightly flattened, oval-shaped objects. Each device was about the size of a grape and was constructed of black plastic and polished metal. A groove ran axially along the flattened side, and four smaller equally spaced lines radiated transversely outward from it. Upon further scrutiny, he noticed seams, as thin as hairs, scribing the entire surface in a complex geometric pattern.

“They look like mechanical origami. Whatever they are, they're all folded up.” AJ said, inspecting the ovoids.

“Mechanical origami . . . I like that one,” VanCleave replied, “I'll have to add that to the list.”

“What are these things?”

“They have lots of names: spiders, crawlers, Abbey's ants, robo-bugs.”

“What do they do?”

“They crawl into wire ducts, server racks, computer terminals. They can plug themselves into ports, bite into data cables, and stream data wirelessly. They were my idea,” VanCleave sniffed. “The good old days when you could hack into anybody's mainframe are gone. No organization concerned with file security would network their data centers to the Internet when their files contain ultra-sensitive information. Even the best firewall can be hacked. But the best hacker in the world can't remotely access a physically segregated network.”

“You're telling me these things are remote control bugs that hack computer networks?”

“Autonomous mechanical infiltrators . . . yes.”

“Next you're going to tell me that the Coordinators aren't actual people but Artificial Intelligence programs,” AJ said.

“Don't be ridiculous. We're at least five years away from having virtual Coordinators,” VanCleave replied stone-faced.

“All right boys, I'm sure this is all very interesting, but we have a timetable to meet. Our ride is waiting,” Albane said. “VanCleave, we'll be live in twenty minutes.”

“I'll be ready.”

“Yes, I understand, Madame Viskaya, but we were not made aware of this inspection, so I have no authorization to let you into the facility,” the sturdy woman at the reception desk insisted.

A small crowd had gathered in the lobby of the Chiarek Norse research hospital. The day manager had been called down from her office, and despite her bulldogged stance, was beginning to sweat. Two security guards had also joined the mix. The senior guard, a heavyset middle-aged man with dark circles under his eyes, and the door guard, a tall, muscular boy of about nineteen, had taken post on opposing corners of the desk. Like a pair of unmatched bookends they stood at attention, gargoyle and knight. Standing opposite the day manager was Veronika Viskaya with her hands planted firmly on the desk leaning forward over a stack of official Ministry of Health inspection documents she had ramrodded through the proper channels an hour earlier. To her left stood Albane Mesnil, and to her right Kalen Immel. They were dressed in fine dark-colored suits tailored in the physique-accentuating European fashion. Veronika had taken the lead and assumed a direct and assertive posturing. Kalen feigned boredom, frequently yawning and checking his watch. Albane had remained silent, but was passively garnering the attention of the male security guards.

Think Tank Scenario Bravo Fourteen Delta was proceeding precisely according to plan.

“Of course you do not have pre-authorization. This is a
surprise
inspection. If the Ministry were to inform your management in advance, it would no longer be a surprise, now would it?” Veronika barked in Czech.

“This is a secure building, and I simply cannot let someone walk in from the street and grant access for a tour,” the day manager retorted.

“I don't think you understand. I have official government paperwork here that says that you must make your facility available for a health and safety inspection. We have received information that a biological contamination breach occurred at this very facility within the past seventy-two hours. An inspection is mandatory. We are not asking for your permission, we are informing you that we
will
be conducting the inspection and demand your cooperation.”

“I am sorry, Madame Inspector, but we are under strict instructions that no unauthorized personnel may enter these premises at any time for any reason,” the woman replied with conviction. “I am authorized to order the guards to use force to protect this mandate.”

Veronika looked at Albane.

Albane removed her eyeglasses, carefully folded them, and placed them inside her breast pocket. She then stared directly into the reception attendant's eyes, holding the gaze in silence until the other woman looked away. Then she removed her mobile phone from its belt holster and began to dial.

The woman fidgeted. “What are you doing? Who are you calling?”

“This facility is hereby closed, until further notice by the Ministry of Health. I am calling the state police,” Albane replied stoically in Czech.

“What? You can't do that!”

“I can, and I am.” Albane leaned forward, pretending to strain to read the name tag on the woman's shirt. “Not to worry, Ms. Provst, in my report I will be sure to document that you were steadfast in your truculence and hindrance of official Ministry business. I'm certain that your management will take your loyalty into consideration when they are rehiring security positions six months from now when the facility reopens.”

“What? You can't close this facility for six months! How am I supposed to provide for my family?”

“It is funny that you keep telling me what I can and cannot do. The Ministry does not care about your opinion. Now, either you give me your full cooperation this instant, or you and your coworkers will all be arrested by the state police.
Do I make myself clear?”
Albane slammed the bottom of her clenched fist on the reception desk with such force that Ms. Provst, the security guards, and even Veronika, were startled.

“Okay. Please, please do not call the state police. You will have our cooperation. I have never had one of these inspections before. What do we need to do?”

Albane put her mobile phone back into its holster. “It's quite simple really. Madame Viskaya will stay here and interview you. Once your interview is complete, then you can begin filling out the official paperwork, while she interviews the guards. My colleague and I will tour the facility and then conduct a record review.”

“How long will the inspection last?”

“That depends on what we find, now doesn't it?”

“We have a shift change soon.”

“That's okay, we don't mind. You will need to make sure that someone is available during the next shift to answer our questions should we have any. If the hour grows late and the record audit is not complete, we'll return in the morning to finish.”

“But, I'm not sure that—”

Albane interrupted, “But, nothing. We are wasting time.” She then retrieved her eyeglasses with hidden nano-camera technology from her suit pocket, and put them on. “The first thing we'll need to look at are the blueprints of this building.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Technical online?”

E. VanCleave—
RS:Technical
: “Technical online.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Technical, report status of acquiring network access.”

E. VanCleave—
RS:Technical
: “Negative access. Bio is a go for entry.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Bio, online?”

A. Archer—
RS:Bio
: “This is Bio, I copy you.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “You are a go for entry. Social has scanned the building plans. I am uploading the data now.”

A. Archer—
RS:Bio
: “Is my route inside the building mapped yet?”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Standby. I'll advise you when it is . . . Electrician online?”

Local Embed—
Electrician
: “This is the Electrician, online and in position at the underground electrical distribution box. Standing by to cut power on your mark.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Roger. What about the backup generator?”

Local Embed—
Electrician
: “Disabled.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Roger . . . Physical, this is the Coordinator. All Resources are in position, you're a go for blocking the door.”

The middle-aged security guard flashed Albane a furtive grin; she pretended not to notice. After twenty-three years working security, smiling was as foreign to the muscles of his face as performing a cartwheel is to a nursing home patient. Even after the tongue lashing Albane had given Ms. Provst, Officer Clive Moderkiek had eagerly volunteered to escort the inspectors during their tour of the facility. It was not for fear of losing his job; he wasn't worried about that. It was simply to be near her. He had never encountered a woman as beautiful and confident as this Inspector woman before, and now he was captured by her gravity.

“Officer Moderkiek, please show us where the contamination breach occurred,” Albane directed in Czech.

“Do you mean the emergency exit where the patient escaped?”

“Yes. We can start there and work backward. I want to see the exact path that he took. I want to know how he escaped from his room and got outside this building.”

“Okay, no problem. All compromised areas have been thoroughly decontaminated. Follow me,” Moderkiek said. Leaving his colleagues behind in the lobby with Veronika, Moderkiek led Albane and Kalen past the elevator bank and through a closed door with an exit sign overhead.

“This is an old building. The elevators were not installed until the 1980s. At one time, this stairwell was the main stairwell for traveling between all the floors of the building, but now it functions as the emergency exit. During the incident, the patient jumped from the fourth floor and landed here,” Moderkiek explained.

Albane looked down at the concrete floor. “How did he accomplish such a feat without injury?”

“I wasn't on duty that night, but the story is that he tied bedsheets together into a rope and used it to repel down to the ground.”

Kalen snorted.

“Interesting. What did he do next?” Albane asked.

“He went through this door to Corridor E. At the end of the corridor is the emergency exit door which leads to the street.”

“Show us.”

“There is nothing to show. It is a typical emergency exit door.”

“I want you to show us anyway.”

The guard nodded obediently and led the pair down the long empty corridor until they arrived at the red metal door. “See, just a door.”

“Does this door have a magnetic lock?”

“No,” the guard replied quizzically.

“So my colleague can just push it open?”

“Of course, it's an emergency exit . . . Hey, what are you doing? Don't open that. The alarm will sound!”

A shrill pulsating alarm reverberated in Corridor E, and white strobes on the emergency exit sign above the door flashed. Kalen had opened the red door and was pretending to peer outside onto the street. With his hip depressing the horizontal rocker bar, he used his body to block the guard's view of the lock mechanism. In his left hand, he held a small cylinder—the size of a tube of lipstick—which contained a quick-dry epoxy adhesive mixed with propellant. He sprayed the adhesive liberally over the door latch mechanism while it was retracted. The epoxy film hardened on contact, instantly seizing the latch. Behind him, he could hear the security guard yelling, arguing with Albane. He released the rocker arm, looking down to make sure the latch did not spring back into position. It did not. He then let the door swing shut and turned to face the others, while slipping the epoxy back into his pocket with the fluidity of a magician.

“What the hell did you do that for? That is a security violation. I have to file a report on all security violations,” Moderkiek complained.

“Officer Moderkiek,” Albane said, “This emergency exit door was the point of a major contamination breech. We are here to evaluate the level of biosecurity for this facility. I see absolutely no controls in place at this boundary for biosecurity. This door can be opened by anyone.”

“With all due respect, Madame Inspector, this door is an emergency exit. It is supposed to be free to open without any interference. If this door were locked, then during a fire anyone trapped inside corridor would die! Fire escapes are not biosecurity boundaries. Biosecurity is established via access checkpoints on each floor of the building, according to the classification of the work being conducted on the floor. The convention we use here is that Building Level Four, in other words the fourth floor, has BioSafety Level Four controls. The third floor has BioSafety Level Three controls. That way it is not confusing. You can only imagine the mess we'd have if the third floor had Level Four controls and the fourth floor had Level Three controls,” Moderkiek explained, chuckling as did.

“Yes, well, that is one way of doing it, I suppose. We can talk about that later with our supervisors. Now, take us to the biosecurity access point on Level Four. We want to see the controls you have in place there.”

•     •     •

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Bio, this is the Coordinator. Take station at the emergency exit door.”

A. Archer—
RS:Bio
: “This is Bio, roger that. Moving into position.”

C. Remy—
RS:Coordinator
: “Electrician, standby to cut power.”

Local Embed—
RS:Electrician
: “Standing by.”

A. Archer—
RS:Bio
: “Coordinator, this is Bio. How is the video feed from my glasses?”