Zero Day: A Novel by Mark Russinovich, Howard Schmidt Page A

had that information, I could rush through the fix and the antivirus changes, and we could stop this thing in its tracks.”
    Jeff smiled. “You have a black-ops team that does that?”
    “Hell, no,” Daryl said grimly, “but we sure as hell need one.”

13
    LOWER MANHATTAN, NYC
    WORLD TRADE CENTER SITE
    TUESDAY, AUGUST 15
    11:47 A.M.
    Exhausted as he was, Jeff wanted nothing so much as to go straight to his hotel room, but there was no denying this. It had to be done.
    Two blocks to the west he located a subway, bought a MetroCard, then rode the train downtown. The car was clean, cleaner than he recalled from his summer of weekend trips here that ill-fated year.
    For two years, Jeff had been in a serious relationship with Cynthia Wheel. They’d lived in the same complex just outside Richmond, Virginia, and had met at the gym they shared. Petite with raven hair, she’d been a vivacious and bright young woman. It had been easy to settle into the life of an old married couple with her, without ever actually “doing the deed,” as she was fond of saying, especially when naked and about to suggest another bout of sexual play.
    Jeff felt a real sense of loss when, in May of 2001, Cynthia’s company, ARM—Account Resources Management—of Richmond, Virginia, had transferred her to Manhattan. Jeff helped her pack, then drove her to her new apartment. “We won’t let this be the end of us,” she assured him just as he prepared to leave. “I promise.” She’d kissed him sweetly on the mouth, stepped back, flashed her winning smile, and said, “Wish me luck.”
    In the months that followed, his routine was consistent. He began recording the long hours he normally gave the CIA gratis and left the office at 1:00 p.m. every Friday, to take the shuttle flight to New York City. After spending the weekend with Cynthia, he’d return home late Sunday. In August, she’d flown to see him twice, complaining of the sweltering heat in Manhattan, but by September she was thrilled as the days turned cooler with the prospect of autumn.
    That August Jeff had received a disk originally seized from the ruling Taliban by one of the rival Afghan groups. He’d cracked into the disk within minutes of receiving it and saw at once that, despite its provenance, it was not Taliban. It had been prepared by a group called Al Qaeda, “the base.”
    Dredging up a vague memory of Al Qaeda, Jeff remembered it was one of a number of terrorist groups on the radar screen of the Company, though it held no significance to him. He checked the terrorist database to which he routinely contributed and was brought up cold. Led by an enormously rich and shadowy figure, Osama bin Laden, Al Qaeda might not be the biggest or best-known terrorist group, but it tended to target Americans with deadly results.
    For the next three days Jeff gleaned information from the disk, then carefully analyzed its contents, a role beyond his purview. Checking the master database several times, he found a dozen recent entries that seemed connected.
    Next, he drafted a time line. On one side of the program he listed information by date, to analyze the data flow. On the other, he listed events in the order they were to occur. He could scarcely believe what he was seeing. He printed the program, sketched an analysis, then buzzed his boss’s secretary and asked for a meeting as soon as possible.
    For the next two hours Jeff reviewed his information, tearing it apart as a critic might. The stark facts remained. Only an idiot, someone too blind to see the obvious, could fail to see what he’d uncovered. With dismay, he realized that was a good description of his boss.
    George Carlton was a burly man of average height, turned soft by two decades in government bureaucracy. His sallow skin had become excessively sensitive to daylight over the years and he now burned quite easily. When he came into the office after a weekend in the country or at sea, his face would shine a bright