Chapter 8 #2
“Oh, a Chinese government-sponsored hacking group definitely exists,” said France. “We know that. We’ve all been at the receiving end of their cyber-intrusions. We just don’t think it’s from some B-grade movie.”
Once again, Zhou didn’t try to hide his amusement.
While this was happening, the head of CSIS, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service, gestured to the man behind her and spoke briefly. He then left the room.
“Who told you that, about Wang Lai?” the Italian Intelligence chief asked.
Grant McAllister considered before he spoke; then he consulted his people, including Zhou. There was an animated discussion while the faces on the wall waited, with increasing annoyance.
“Do you not trust us, Grant?” asked the woman from Japan.
He turned back to them. “Vivien Li.”
That threw the group into animated debate.
They were divided between those who revered Vivien Li and those who felt the famous dissident’s usefulness was long past. If it ever existed at all.
There were many who felt she was better at self-promotion and marketing than at collecting useful information or creating meaningful change.
Some even wondered if she was who she said she was. There was, after all, precious little documentation about Vivien Li.
“The President trusts her,” said McAllister; then, after a very brief pause, which no one missed, “And so do I.”
“Look,” said Sarah Khan, the head of Canadian Intelligence. “We all know it’s unlikely Chen would replace his trusted head of the MSS, never mind choose a woman to head up such a powerful department. But he’s doing things never done before. This could be true. And if so, what does it say?”
“We can’t possibly know what it says for sure,” said the head of Spanish Intelligence. “We can say that, if true, it shows Eeyore is becoming erratic, unpredictable.”
“Shoring up support,” said Germany.
“Which would mean it needs shoring up,” said Italy. He leaned forward, so close to the camera his nose appeared immense. “But—”
“But that’s what the old dog might want us to think,” said Khan. “Chen’s been at this longer than any of us. Before becoming President, he himself was the head of the secret police.” She looked down at her file again, paused, then said, “And before that, he ran the United Front Work Department.”
Chen’s background, his rise to power, was a closely guarded secret. They knew he was from peasant stock in the hardscrabble province of Shaanxi. But this UFW information was news to most of them.
The United Front Work Department was the stuff of legends. Created by Mao, the UFW was considered one of the pillars of the Communist Party. A bulwark against the West.
To this day, its job was to gather intelligence on, and gain influence over, elites, both individuals and organizations inside and outside China.
It recruited and groomed influential foreigners, especially politicians.
It did so by knowing which buttons to push.
The desires, the vulnerabilities, the weaknesses and ambitions of its targets.
It won them over with a clever combination of bribery, blackmail, threats. But mostly good old-fashioned mind-fucks. Appealing to ego. Using flattery and seduction. The promise of wealth and power.
It was amazing to these hardened intelligence agents just how fragile, how vulnerable, the egos of those in power proved.
“The purpose of the UFW is to convince those who can sway opinion that China is a friend,” said the head of MI6. “That the way to mutual wealth and peace is through cooperation, through trade and tourism, not confrontation.”
“UFW is a propaganda tool,” said Italy.
“It’s a weapon,” said Khan. “This is soft power. But power nevertheless.”
“Okay, but what does that have to do with the alarms today?” asked McAllister. “And stopping whatever is planned next?”
“Maybe nothing,” admitted Khan. “But someone knew about the attack. Someone must’ve let the Chinese into our systems. And that someone knows what’s going to happen next. Someone’s been bought off, brainwashed, maybe even threatened into helping. Probably by the United Front Work Department.”
“That’s a bit of a leap, isn’t it?”
“If yesterday I’d come to you to say the Chinese are going to set off every alarm worldwide at once, would you have believed me?” the Canadian asked.
That shut them up.
“Listen,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s true. I just know the unlikely, the unthinkable, is happening, and we need to get our heads out of our asses.”
Without glancing down, the Canadian closed her file.
McAllister looked at her for a moment, but no more, before moving on.
“The People’s Congress is taking place in a few days’ time in the Great Hall in Beijing. There’s a chance whatever is planned next will happen then.”
“We don’t know that anything is planned,” the Australian pointed out.
“We didn’t know about today,” said Fillmore. “Let’s just assume something is. Something that will affect us all.”
“We need to figure out how they did it today,” said McAllister. “Then we might get closer to stopping the next round.”
“What do we think is next?” asked the head of MI5. “Bombs?”
“No, I think something more widespread,” said Germany. “It must be a cyberattack of some kind.”
They all spent most of their time imagining just such a disaster. And trying to avoid it. Having backups within backups. But even the safety nets were virtual. Run by computers.
Yes, it would be a cyberattack, but what would be the target? Transportation? Banking? The internet?
Any one of those things would bring the world to its knees.
Assignments were handed out, though everyone knew it was useless to try to keep the heads of the international intelligence services in any sort of lane.
Each chief believed they owned the road and were uniquely placed to get to the answer.
First. To save the world from the coming nightmare, their worst-case scenario.
But they were wrong. There were worse cases.
Worse nightmares waited behind the closed door.
Alice had planned to ask about getting their old Columbia University group together but was relieved the idea came from Jen.
They agreed to meet at Dive Bar on Amsterdam, where they’d hung out as broke and thirsty kids.
Students were already crammed in, wolfing down bowls of chips and nuts that might be their dinner.
The pieces of conversation Alice heard as they shoved their way toward the back all centered on the alarms. Keen, smart, immortal young people, excited about what had happened.
Aware of, but unconcerned by, what might happen next.
They’d solve it. They’d certainly survive it.
The two women found a sticky table by the bathrooms. Every time the door opened, and closed, they could smell disinfectant.
Could be worse, thought Alice. Had been worse. Might still be worse.
Within minutes, they were joined by four others. Men and women who’d been kids when they’d last left the bar.
Among them were Liam’s old roommate Jack, an engineer, and his physicist wife, Cassandra, along with a couple of other old friends from their grad school days.
With jugs of beer and shot glasses for vodka in front of them, they toasted Liam.
Several shots in, someone remembered the time Liam lost control on his rollerblades and grabbed onto a hot dog cart to try to stop his momentum, only to end up dragging it into the middle of the Great Lawn in Central Park.
Liam. Murdered. But Alice couldn’t tell them that. They all believed his death was a terrible accident.
Another round of shots.
“Do you remember,” Jack said, “that time he went into anaphylactic shock?”
Cassandra closed her eyes and shook her head. How could she ever forget? It was her birthday, and they were treating themselves to dinner at a hipster Thai restaurant in the Village before going to listen to some jazz at the Vanguard.
The birthday girl insisted on pad thai and fried stuffed chicken wings. Everyone dug in, passed plates, and a happy buzz descended on the group.
Suddenly Liam stood up. His eyes bulging. His lips swelling. He was gasping for breath. Jack, sitting next to him, jumped up and gently lowered him to the floor.
“You kept saying, ‘Breathe, breathe,’” said Jen. “Like he had to be told.”
She and Alice had both pulled out their phones to call an ambulance. Cassandra was frozen in her seat, a half-eaten chicken wing in her hand.
By the time they got to the hospital, Liam had passed out. Emergency doctors gave him an epinephrine shot and hooked him up to a bag of fluids. Two hours later, he grinned apologetically at the group of friends that had gathered around his bed.
“I forgot. I shouldn’t have ordered the prawn curry.”
“So like Liam,” said Jack. “His gluttony almost killed him. Imagine forgetting his allergy?”
“Imagine ruining my birthday,” said Cassandra.
“Yes,” said Jen. “That’s the headline.” She looked at Alice. Emotional intelligence was not a physicist’s strong suit.
Liam had an allergy to shellfish? thought Alice. How could she have forgotten that? But so many of his food posts had centered on crab and shrimp. He loved scallops. Lobster was his favorite. Maybe he grew out of it. Did people?
That memory of the time Liam almost died, years before he really did, was a sobering slap back to reality. Two more rounds of shots were required.
“Fuck.” Jack slammed down his glass. “I can’t believe he’s gone. I just messaged him a few weeks ago, asking when he might be coming back through town. It’s been months since we caught up.”
“Do you happen to have his address?”
“I have his phone and email,” said Jack. “You mean where he lives?”
“Yes.”
They all shook their heads. Since no one sent letters anymore, their physical address didn’t matter.
They lived in a virtual world.
“Why do you think I have more to say?” asked Sarah Khan, the head of Canadian Intelligence.
She was on his private screen.
“Because I know you. And because you closed your folder so none of us could see.”
“If I did that, why would I now say anything to you?”
“Because you’re here now.”
She smiled.
“Am I wrong?”
“No. But I need time to think.”
“We have no time. Look, I agree with you, we need to start considering the inconceivable. So, what inconceivable thing is in that folder?”
Oh, fuck it. She heaved a sigh; then, without consulting her notes, she said, “Have you ever heard of Pangu?”
After the friends had said their goodbyes, Alice made her way back to Moynihan Train Hall and the last Acela back to Washington. She slumped into her seat for the three-hour journey.
It had been an exhausting day, emotionally and physically. Alice leaned her head against the window and pulled out her phone.
Her last thoughts before falling asleep were of Liam’s smiling, rubbery face. And that time they almost lost him. Anaphylactic shock. It was terrifying. And yet somehow he’d gotten over his allergy.
Or maybe not. Maybe he’d eaten something with shrimp in it and his throat had closed up.
And in his panic, he’d fallen overboard.
And in the dark, they couldn’t rescue him.
That made sense, as long as you thought Liam, brilliant Liam, was stupid enough to forget about his deadly allergy.
But how was it a lot of his blog was about shellfish?
There was one other possibility.
Suppose, Alice’s fuzzy mind mumbled, suppose it wasn’t the shrimp that did it that first time. Suppose his allergy wasn’t to shellfish.
Fully awake now, Alice pulled her phone out and googled Thai shrimp curry. Then she looked at that last photograph again.
“Holy shit.”