Blake Schwendiman's Blog and Blook

Chapter 43

Saturday, 12 March 2022 – 11:00 a.m. MST

“Val, I’m sorry to bother you on a Saturday, but I need you to come into the office,” Quinn said as he strode through the atrium of his building.

“I’m already here,” she answered.

“Thanks, Val. I’ll be up in a second.”

The ride to the top floor was excruciatingly long. Quinn pored over the data as he traveled. On the surface everything seemed to be in order, but the future was all wrong. Everything was most certainly not in order.

“What’s going on Val?” Quinn asked as he stepped out of the elevator.

“I hoped you knew,” she replied. For nearly forty-five minutes the entire futurestream had been in flux. Events throughout the timeline were changing at an unprecedented rate. The probabilities of events were increasing and decreasing apparently at random.

“It looks like we have a security breach,” Quinn sighed.

“Sireesha?”

“I’m sure of it. She and Daniel are the only people who know enough about the system to have pulled off something like that.”

“But why now?”

Quinn shook his head. “They must be planning to do something. Something we would have noticed – so they disrupt the stream and we’re blind.”

“What do we do?” Valerie knew there would be no simple answer. The futurestream was a secret subsystem installed on all of their switches that nobody else understood. Quinn had distanced himself from the firmware development in recent releases. He couldn’t fix the problem and they both knew it.

Quinn exhaled. “We need to call Bryan,” he responded. There was a resignation in his voice that Valerie had never before heard. Quinn had never called for help with his own technology before. But the futurestream had never been compromised before.

Valerie raised her eyebrows, “Are you sure?”

“Yes. We have no options.”

“And tell him everything?” she asked.

“No,” Quinn responded sharply. “Right now we’ll have him search for a general security breach. Perhaps he can identify the attack without the details.”

Valerie nodded. “Do you trust him?”

Quinn chuckled. “He’s the best person we have.”

“That may be, but...”

“We may not have time to do anything else.”

Valerie shrugged. He was right.

“Do you think he’ll have a problem coming in today?” Quinn asked.

Valerie shook her head in disgust and her lips curled as she continued, “He’s already here. Looks like he slept here again.”

“Call him.”

Bryan had slept in the office. He had been working late then decided to catch a nap before going home. He was startled by the chime of his phone and fumbled to answer it. His shock grew when he heard Valerie’s voice on the other end of the line. He knew her voice well, but she hadn’t actually spoken to him for three years, two months and six days. The last thing she had said to him in person was, “Thank you.” He had held the elevator for her.

“Bryan,” she asked, “we need you up in the presidential suite as soon as possible.”

“Five minutes,” he replied.

“Thank you.”

Five minutes would be ample time for most people, but Bryan could barely make the elevators in that time. He straightened his shirt as he waddled through the corridors, huffing and cursing with each step.

It was six and a half minutes before he stepped out of the elevator. His face was red and beaded. He wiped his brow as he stepped into the main conference room. Quinn looked up as Bryan’s pungent body odor trailed him in and consumed the office.

“Sorry it took me so long,” Bryan huffed as he fell into a nearby conference chair.

“Not a problem,” Quinn responded as he tried to focus on his purpose. “I believe we have a security situation.”

Bryan’s face dropped. “Impossible,” he nearly shouted. “I mean, excuse me, I’m sorry ... I mean, what kind of situation?”

Quinn shook his head. “I’m not sure. I just have a very good reason to believe that the firmware on some or all of our switches may have been compromised.”

Bryan had assumed that Quinn had meant an internal network breach. The thought of an external breach caused his already strained heart to thump anew. He wouldn’t see the outside of the building for a long time. “How? When?”

“I don’t know how. But it started within the last hour.”

“What makes you think that something is wrong? At least one of my monitors should have sounded for any large-scale attack.”

“It may not be a large-scale attack. It may be very small. I just know that something isn’t right. I need you to run a complete diagnostic on as many of the switches as you can in the next hour and then let us know what you find.”

Bryan nodded. He felt queasy as he lumbered out of the conference room. His network had never been compromised before. A rush of anger coursed through him and he picked up his pace. If there were an attack, he would discover it. “Nobody hacks my system,” he wheezed.

Valerie searched Quinn’s face for any sign of his true state of mind. She could usually read his expressions, but this morning he was distant and disconnected.

“I’ve got to go,” Quinn started, “Today’s Jordan’s day.” He looked up at Val and smiled. His eyes reflected a longing that Valerie recognized. He had once told her that he wished for a simpler life – a life in which he could spend more time with his family, a life in which he could avoid weekend crises, a life like normal people have.

“I’ll keep you informed,” Valerie said.

“Are you still planning on coming?” Quinn asked. Jordan had always been close to Valerie. All the kids called her Auntie Val.

“I was planning to come, but we’ll see how this goes,” Valerie answered. She knew she could manage most everything remotely from the pageant, but she also knew that this was an unprecedented event that may require unprecedented action.

“Thanks, Val,” Quinn said as he stood to leave. He turned and looked at her. “Be careful. You may not be able to see what’s coming anymore.” Quinn hadn’t felt so disarmed and so helpless for years. He had relied on the futurestream for years. Without it, he felt powerless. Without it, he felt fear.