Cipher (4 page)

At a busy café in Istanbul Turkey on
Bağdat Avenue, Jonathan Grace sat with
Dr. Jennifer Cobalt. The street was packed with people. It was a weekend, and
the roads and walkways were filled with pedestrians out for an evening stroll, window-shopping,
or on their way to get a bite to eat. The rich aromas of lamb and chicken,
along with Mediterranean spices, filled the air. Jonathan sat soaking it all in
as he watched the people go by. Everything about that place was different. He
looked at the people as they passed by and wondered what each of their stories
was.

“Thank you for the taking the time to meet with me Dr.
Cobalt,” he said.

“I don’t have much time, and please just call me Jennifer,” she
replied. “What was so important that you wanted to speak to me about that you
had to fly 5,000 miles to meet with me in person?”

“It’s about your research,” Jonathan said as he took a sip
of the tea in the thin slender curved transparent glass.

“The advanced algorithms?” she asked, taking off her slender
brown frames and placing them on the table. She sat back and crossed her legs
and her arms. She was closing herself off to the world.

“Yes.”

“Who sent you?”

“I can’t discuss that with you,” said Jonathan, taking
another sip of the tea.

“I knew I should have never gotten involved with that
project. My friends and colleagues all warned me but I didn’t listen.”

“Warned you about what?”

“The project. It got out of hand. It got very out of hand,”
she said silently as if someone was going to overhear
their
conversation.

“I’m afraid I still don’t follow. I need some background
information. Can you tell me more about it? I don’t have that much information
to go on.” Jonathan couldn’t tell her the real reason he was there. He couldn’t
tell her that he was on the hunt for the little USB cipher drive. He wasn’t
about to blow his cover that quickly. But as he sat there staring at the woman
in the early evening hours, he couldn’t help but notice just how striking she
was. Her high cheekbones and slender flame, combined with her puffy lips and pale
blue eyes, gave Jonathan that feeling in his stomach he felt when he was
incredibly attracted to a woman. He tried to hide his clear interest in her
from a sexual point of view.

“I never wanted to get involved with that project. They
approached me with helping them with some advanced algorithm computations for
secure socket layers, or SSL, the standard data encryption method on the
Internet.”

“Who approached you?” Jonathan asked.

“Advanced Biogenics. It’s a lab out of Arlington, Virginia.
They’re on the leading edge of some of the most revolutionary research in the
field of genetics and mathematics. As a Harvard Fellow, I thought it would be a
great addition to my resume, and I was excited by the possibility of publishing
a paper based on my research.”

“Well, what happened? Why was it such a bad idea then?”
Jonathan watched her cross her legs again. Her skinny jeans snapped fit to her
elongated legs that Jonathan couldn’t keep his eyes off. She met his stare ogling
her figure multiple times. He couldn’t help himself. Even though she looked
closed off and her body language indicated she wasn’t telling the truth, he
became infatuated with her as he sat there directly across the table. The glass
tabletop made it easy enough for Jonathan to soak in every ounce of her body
from the legs on up.

“My eyes are up here, you know,” she
replied
back.

“I’m… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to…”

“It’s okay. I’m used to it by now. You can only imagine what
I have to endure living here. I’m like a magnet for predators around here,” she
said. She nodded at the street filled with people walking by, most of
whom
were devouring her with their eyes just as Jonathan had
been doing.

“I’m really sorry about that. I didn’t know… I mean… I don’t
know what I want to say here. I’m not usually like this. Honestly.”

“That’s okay. I get it. You’re a man. You can’t help
yourself.” She uncrossed,
then
recrossed her legs,
switching from the right to the left side as she leaned back into the chair.

Jonathan cracked a half smile, but he didn’t feel
comfortable with himself. He didn’t feel right for looking at her the way he
was, but he couldn’t help himself. She was his ideal: smart, and sexy. Then
again, she was probably every man’s ideal.

“Anyhow,” she continued, disrupting his very sexual train of
though, “The research was some of the most exciting stuff that I had ever
worked on, until the parameters changed. The goals of the project changed from
something so simple and innocent, to something much more complex and
calculated.”

“What do you mean? Calculated how?”

“Well, it started harmless enough. The SSL research was
merely an extension of my advanced algorithm ciphers that that have been the
subject of my obsessive post-doctoral work for the past 5 years. But, it got so
much more involved when they reclassified the project, and quarantined me at
the lab. I had no life back then and I wasn’t allowed to leave. I was basically
a slave to that lab.”

“What happened with the research? How far did you get with
it?”

“Well, pretty far. It was revolutionary in fact. Within the
first 6 months at the lab, I had created an advanced algorithm cipher that
could penetrate any 1024-bit RSA key security level. I thought we were working
on prevention of course, but my research made it possible for penetration into
any system. I thought we were going to extend that research into advancing the
RSA levels of security, but they wanted more from me.”

“I did some research on the 1024-bit RSA key crack. I
haven’t been able to find any information that shows it’s hackable. From
current computing standards, it would take 7-months to brute force attack and
crack a 1024-bit RSA key.” Jonathan looked at her with a puzzled expression. He
knew there was a lot more to the whole story that he just
wasn’t
understanding
or that she wasn’t telling him. So much of it was over his
head, but he made it is duty to understand just what it all meant.

“That’s what it used to be, until my advanced algorithm
coupling mechanism. What used to take 7
months,
could
now be done in under 30 minutes. But there’s more.”

“More?”

“Yes,” she replied, “they wanted me to continue my research
to extend my algorithms into breaking a 2048-bit RSA key, something that could
break into the highest possible levels of security on the Web for years to
come. That’s what they made me work on for a year in that lab.”

“And? Did you actually do it? Did you figure it out?”

“Yes, but I wasn’t allowed to leave the research facility
until it was all completed. Don’t get me wrong, they paid me very well for the
project, but I have nothing to show for it. I wasn’t allowed to publish any
papers on the subject of my research and everything was kept very hush hush.”

Jonathan looked on as she spoke. He paid careful attention
to the words that were coming out of her mouth. In fact, he also paid very
careful attention to her mouth as well. She could have been a model for all he
knew. That’s how pretty she was, he thought in his mind.
Get a hold of yourself. Stop obsessing.

“I have to tell you that it’s all very intriguing to me,”
Jonathan replied, picking up the menu to look at what else the café offered.

“Well, I’m glad you’re intrigued,” she said with an air of
sarcasm. “Is that why we’re here?
Because I intrigue you?
Or is it the work that you’re
intrigued with?”

She had caught him off guard. He was never good around
women, especially beautiful women. And, it had been so long since he had truly
interacted with a beautiful woman like her. He had closed himself off for years
after his wife passed. He didn’t quite know what to say, but he just blurted
out the first thing that came to his mind. “Both.”

She smiled at that and almost laughed. Did she think he was
funny or was she flirting with him? “I’m terrible at this. I’m usually not so
clumsy with my words. Maybe I need a drink. Say, how come there’s no alcohol on
this menu?”

“You won’t find alcohol on most of these menus. Remember,
this is primarily a Muslim country. If you want alcohol, we would probably have
to go to a hookah lounge or a proper restaurant nearby. It’s just, these
mainstream cafes won’t carry it here, and if you ask them, you’ll be insulting
them.”

So much was different in Turkey. Something that was so
readily available in every corner store in the United
States,
couldn’t be purchased the same way. “What about bars and clubs? Does Istanbul
have any of those?”

“Of course it does. It’s just different when it comes to
cafes here like this on a main boulevard like this one. A fancy restaurant here
will have it and so will the hookah lounges, but not the cafes.”

“Okay, makes sense I suppose,” he said.

“It’s still readily available here. Just not exactly like it
is in the states. Make sense?”

“Yeah. That makes sense. What do you say we head to a hookah
lounge, or possibly a bar? I’m always much better when I have a few drinks.” Of
course, that was a lie. The last thing Jonathan needed to do was to have a drink.
That was the last thing he ever needed to do.

“I can’t tonight. How about tomorrow night? Saturday night.”

“Okay, deal.”

“How long are you here for?” she asked.

“Until I can finish the job?”

“What’s the job exactly then?” she asked, looking at him
with a new sense of suspect.

“I can’t really say exactly.” He was playing hard to get and
it was annoying her just enough to be more curious.

“Well, clearly it has something to do with my research. I
have a few guesses.”

“Yes, of course it has to do something with your research,”
he said in response.

“Okay, well I have to get going. I’ll see you tomorrow
night,” she said.

“See you then.”

Somewhere along the French Riviera, off
the coast of Monaco, Boris Medviek’s superyacht cut through the waters at full
throttle. The powerful yet silent motors of the vessel raced through
international waters, slicing through waves like a hot knife through butter.
The sleek audacious piece of machinery vaulted forward with the ease of a
gliding bird as it jettisoned its passengers and crew across the sea with
careless intent. Boris walked out to the rear of the upper deck with a pair of
binoculars and peered with a watchful eye out towards the shore. His constant
paranoia since he had taken position of the USB cipher drive had increased at a
rampant pace.

“What do you think of all this, Dmitry?” he asked.

They were standing in the twilight of the setting sun, and
something just didn’t feel right to Boris. The plan felt too good to be true.
He had accomplished so much but still felt so far away. He knew that uneasy
feeling meant something bad was on the horizon. Anytime he felt that uneasiness
on the inside, something was bound to go wrong. He figured it was just a matter
of time. He tried to think about the severity of the situation. He tried to
balance it all in his mind. He had a vision of what he wanted, but there was so
much involved. So many people to appease were standing in his way. It wasn’t
about the money any more. It hadn’t been about the money for a long time. It
was about the rush of the heist. He wanted to make a name for himself. He
wanted his name to be remembered forever.

Dmitry looked out towards the coastal shores of Monaco. The
yellow lights of the city at sunset reflected beautifully in the deep blue
ocean waters of the Costa Azzura. “I think you and I have been talking about
this day for a long time now,” said Dmitry. “This is going to change
everything, you
know?
The supply of money will be
endless. Just imagine what we can do with it,” he said.

Boris held onto the chromed hand railing at the aft of the
ship as he watched the ocean disappearing behind them, leaving a large ripple
in its wake. He watched the dancing colors in the sky as the sun dipped behind
the ocean in the distance. As they traveled west, he realized just how perfect
it all was. He wanted to bottle up that moment in time and savior it forever.

As he stood there watching the sun and talking to his
comrade, Boris rolled up the sleeves to his white linen dress shirt. “Yes,
brother, we can do very much with it,” he replied. “But think of the power this
will give us. People will bow down to us. No one can stop us. Not even armies.
Nothing. Do you realize that?”

His younger brother Dmitry had envied him for a long time.
He had always looked up to his older and smarter brother, and he realized just
how much he had accomplished in such a short
period of time.
 
But, there was still so much that
had to be done. He reveled in the power the cipher drive brought. Without it,
he would be crippled, and he would do anything in his power to ensure no one
else got their hands on it; anything.

“What about the doctor? She knows too much,” Dmitry said.
His sullen look struck a nerve with Boris. He knew that Dmitry was right. She
was the only one who knew how the algorithms worked. She was the one who had
devised them and that could replicate them again if she chose to. They needed
to eliminate all of the variables in the equation. They couldn’t allow any
stone to go unturned.

“We don’t have to worry about the doctor," She’s not
our problem. She doesn’t know about us, and she couldn’t replicate the black
box without all the data from the lab. And, now that we all the data, the
backups, and the hardware, no one can stand in our way.”
 
Boris clearly wasn’t feeling the same way
his brother was. He didn’t think that the doctor could interfere with their
plans.

“But, she’s a threat brother, I assure you. Weren’t you
always the one to tell me that we should never underestimate people? We can’t
underestimate the doctor. We have to make sure that we tie up all the loose
ends. We can’t have extra baggage lying around out there. Even if she couldn’t
recreate the cipher drive without another year of work,
it’s
her research that
is the foundation for it. I think she’s a threat
brother.”

“What do you suggest we do?” asked Boris.

They both stared out over the railing of the ship as they
stood side by side, looking off into the distance. They soaked in the beauty of
the region as the sun barely set along the horizon. “I think we should send
Viktor to take care of our little problem. We can tell him to keep it clean and
make it quick.”

Boris looked at his comrade. He wasn’t quite sure that it
was the right decision to do, but he didn’t want to appear weak. “Where is the
doctor?” he asked.

“Istanbul. They tell me she’s in Istanbul.”

“Da. Okay. Make the call.”

“Okay, done,” said Dmitry.

Dmitry walked off, leaving Boris there alone in the growing dark
blue hues of the evening sky. The wind rushed through his hair as the vessel
continued cutting through the waters while the engine rumbled silently beneath
him. He listened to the sounds of the waves as they were sliced by the bow of
the ship and he closed his eyes.

*****

On a passenger ferry steaming across the Sea of Marmara just
south of Istanbul, Turkey, Jonathan Grace checked his watch. It was 5:52pm. He
stood in the center of the boat and stretched his head out to check the boat’s distance
from the shore. Two hours and eight minutes before he met with Dr. Cobalt again.
He watched as a thick flock of seagulls tracked the ferry as it glided its way
across the shimmering ancient body of water. The thick black chain-link that
separated the mid-section of the ferry from the water held back the troves of
passengers waiting to disembark at their destinations.

After a day of exploring and seeing the sights of Istanbul,
he was relieved to make more progress with Dr. Cobalt. He was going to get the
nerve to ask her about the cipher drive. She had to know something about its
whereabouts. He tightly gripped the strap of his nylon backpack that was slung
over his shoulder and pulled it closer to his chest. And as the sun kissed the
top of a mosque far off in the distance, he prepared himself. He was ready. He
knew what he was going to say and how he was going to say it. And all day and
night, he couldn’t get that doctor out of his head. He couldn’t get her long
slender legs and her striking features out of his mind. It was as if she was
haunting him. Her beauty haunted him and gave him a feeling he hadn’t felt in
years.

He slipped his hand into his pocket and felt the silver USB
stick Don Cicerone had given him as a reminder of what he had to do. He needed
to remember why he was there in the first place. He couldn’t
get
caught up with this woman just because he thought she was beautiful. But, as he
held the silver USB stick between his thumb and his index finger, he couldn’t
help but think of her more. Why was he so drawn to her? What was it about her
that was so intriguing? Surely, he wanted to know everything about her. He
wanted to find out all that he could about that woman.
But
why?

He had to think more clearly. He had to pull himself
together. And as the boat neared the dock at his destination, he looked out
over the side again to take in the sights. The people pushed in towards the
exit as the boat docked, and Jonathan disembarked to a sea of taxis waiting
along the avenue aside the docks. He hopped into a taxi and gave instructions
to the cabbie that Dr. Cobalt had provided. She was at Istanbul University
doing a lecture on Applied Mathematics, and he had agreed to meet up with her
and drive to an area bar or lounge where they could continue their conversation
over drinks.

As they drove along the docks and towards the Galata Bridge,
the distinct smell of the salty sea rushed through the open car windows. The
breeze felt good on Jonathan’s face, and he smiled. It had been a long time
since he had felt a sense of peace. Maybe getting out of New York was the best
thing he could have done for himself. He closed his eyes and tried to think
back to his dingy Brooklyn apartment. He tried to picture that place again and
his mentality there. He wasn’t happy there. He hadn’t been happy for a long
time. This was what he needed. He finally got the chance to travel and work at
the same time. Life couldn’t get any better, he thought.
It doesn’t get any better than this.

He whipped out his phone to check to see if he had any
messages, as they crossed the short Galata Bridge, and arrived on the other
side of the narrow strait. Based on his maps, the university was only a
15-minute drive from where they were so he checked his messages. He had
forwarded all of this phone calls from his number back home to his
international number he had secured when he arrived. He dialed into the
voicemail system that was setup on the new number. He had a message from Don
Cicerone.
 

Kid. We
gotta
talk. Call me.

In the excitement of arriving in Turkey, he had forgotten to
check in with Don Cicerone. He quickly dialed the number back.

“Hello?” said Vinnie on the other end.

“Hey, it’s Jonathan Grace.”

“Oh, hey. Hold a moment,” he said, and passed the phone to
Don Cicerone.

“Kid?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” said Jonathan.

“What’s the status? What’s the scoop?”

“I located the doctor. In fact, I’m enroute to meet with her
right now.”

“Don’t screw this up kid. Word on the street is that the doc
might be in hot water. Be careful.”

“What do you mean?” If the Italians were telling him to be
careful, then something must be wrong, he thought.

“Look, kid, just be careful. And, check in with me from time
to time. I need to know what’s going on. Also, don’t you dare come back here
without that cipher
drive.
I don’t care what it
takes.”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean kid. Look, come back with the cipher
drive or it’s your neck.”

“Are you threatening me?”

He had already hung up the phone when Jonathan lobbed that
last question. It was almost rhetorical. He knew he was being threatened. He
wasn’t sure why he had even asked that question. As he looked out the window
again, almost in another world, the beauty of the city slipped through his
hands and worry creeped in. When they finally pulled up to the University a few
minutes later, he dialed Dr. Cobalt on the phone. She didn’t answer, but she
sent him a text asking him to come inside because she was wrapping up a lecture
and that class had started late.

Jonathan paid the cab, and walked inside the university. He
made his way through the hallways, following the directions on the text, and
found the lecture room where Dr. Cobalt was teaching. He silently walked in and
took a seat in the back. The students were so enthralled with the lecture that
they barely noticed him slip through the door. He sat there carefully watching
her as she spoke. He couldn’t understand the language, but he looked on with a
silent determination. He was captivated by her liveliness. She was so energetic
and enthusiastic.

When she finished up and the
students
left, he walked down to the front of the class room from up the stairs in the
back. “Hey,” he said.

“Hi. I’m
really sorry
class went over.
I ended up getting in pretty late.”

“It’s okay. It was fascinating to watch you teach. I mean, I
didn’t quite understand a thing that you said, but I was still fascinated by
it.” Jonathan looked at all the formulas on the chalkboard that she was busy
scribbling on during the lecture. “Hey what is all of this stuff?”

“Just some advanced mathematics. Algorithms, some calculus,
you know, boring stuff,” she said. She laughed silently to herself,
then
touched her hand to her neck. He made her nervous.

Jonathan smiled back. “Looks like pretty advanced stuff. I’m
sure most of this would just go right over my head.”

“It’s really not that complex when you get into it. I can
imagine looking from the outside in, but
it’s
not
really that bad,” she said. She had her hair in one of those long ponytails
that really made her look casual. But, even in her attempt to look casual, she
was still striking. Jonathan just stared at her. He couldn’t help himself.

“What? What is it?” she asked.

“Oh… sorry… nothing. Do you want to go get that drink now?”

“Yeah. Sure, that sounds pretty good,” she said.

They walked out of the university together and she wrapped
her elbow inside his, as if she wanted him to guide her out. Jonathan looked at
her for a moment and butterflies filled his stomach. He smiled at her. They
piled into her car, and headed down the road. Within moments, they had arrived
at the restaurant on the water.

“This is my favorite place to eat. I hope you like fish,”
she said.

“Yes, absolutely. I love fish.”

“Then you’re going to love this place,” she cooed. “The fish
here is fresh and it’s caught the same day it’s served. It’s absolutely
incredible.”

They were seated on an outdoor raised terrace overlooking
the water, which was separated from the restaurant by a two-way road. “Wow,
it’s incredible here,”
Jonathan
said. “The view.”

“I know. I love it here. Isn’t Turkey beautiful?” she asked.

“Yes. In fact, ever since I arrived, I’ve felt so much more
alive. It was as if I was dead inside back home. Does that make sense?”

“How so?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I guess I’ve just felt dead inside lately.
The past couple of years have been rough on me.”

“Oh. I’m sorry. Do you want to talk about it?”