Zero Alternative (32 page)

Layla recoiled and stepped back, looking horrified. ‘Is this what you’ve been planning with Mosha? You’re going to cause a world crisis just to destroy Frankel Schwartz?’

‘No.’ Walker raised his hands, palms out. ‘No… I swear, DeepShare had already seen this shakedown coming – it’s going to happen anyway. It’s only another small step in our descent to hell, according to Omega. But this episode should blow over again, just like it did before I met you. It won’t be a real systemic event, I hope.’

‘You
hope
? Have you forgotten what happened after Lehman Brothers?’

‘Never,’ he said. ‘But that’s why I’m not too worried. Look, Lehman going bust changed the world. You can split Finance in Before ’08 and After Lehman.’

‘Like B.C. and A.D.? That’s ridiculous.’ Layla looked at him askance.

‘It’s not, ask any senior banker. And the lesson was learnt, Frankel won’t be allowed to go bust. What they’ll do – they’ll simply break it apart, cut off the pieces and sell them on the cheap, to other banks.’ Walker smiled, savouring the words. ‘The top guys will get the blame, but no one else will lose a penny. And it’s an investment bank anyway, no deposits or mortgages…’

One of the hotel porters spotted them standing just outside and opened the door. Walker pulled gently on Layla’s arm, started up the steps.

‘You make it sound too easy.’ Layla shook her head, unconvinced.

‘Maybe.’ Walker tipped the smartly dressed man and entered the foyer, turning right towards the bar. ‘But I’ve ran it on Deep so many times… it’s going to work. Trust me – what we are doing will simply stop Frankel from having the time and resources to react, because we’ll get those bastards to jail.’

Or he might go down as one of the men who had broken the world’s economy, he guessed. Walker needed to believe his plan would succeed, but there was a part of him that felt stuck, trapped between massive grinding mills. Frankel Schwartz on one side, the Old Man and Hackernym on the other. There had to be a chance that either could grab hold of him, break him and use whatever was left as some sort of scapegoat while they went their own merry way. He was only one man, with a risky plan. But he had Deep – and a fury to make things right, or die trying. He grinned and checked around, found a room-service menu and handed it to Layla. ‘So, what are you going to order?’

She looked queasy. ‘I’m not that hungry, right now.’

The nightmare was always a reflection of itself, full of anguish and pain. Pienaar knew it was a dream because he was his grown-up, powerful self, still dressed in a kid’s pyjamas, sleeping in his little old bed. And, like the six-year-old he had been, there was nothing he could do aside from watching, horrified
.

As so many times before the men had broken the door down and he ran to his parents, scared by the noise and shouting
.

Just in time to see them shoot his kneeling father in the back of the head
.

Mother tried to grab and protect him but they attacked her, beat and kicked her, ripping her nightdress off before…

…before a phone rang, insistently. Again and again, unwilling to stop
.

Pienaar opened his eyes and was instantly awake, his hand shooting for the clumsy sat-phone
. ‘
Yes
.’

‘
Good news, Francois
.’
Friedman’s voice was chippier than usual, and the Australian wanted to vomit
.

‘
We have narrowed it down to three, but by tomorrow we should be certain of where she is
,’
the Englishman said
.

‘
Good
.’

‘
You’re going to the US. Get on the first flight for the West Coast
.’

‘
And Walker?
’

‘
He will be near her, we’re sure. I’ll let you know what the next step is
–
once we’ve located them
.’

‘
I’m ready, but I’ll need some good men. Michel and his team should do
.’

‘
Of course. We’ll fly them over later, but this time you have to make sure Walker really has DeepShare, when we go in. No more mistakes
–
we’re already out of time
.’

Pienaar sighed, restraining himself
. ‘
Tell the others. I’m not the one who screwed up
.’

‘
I think…
’

‘
Make sure of it, mate, or after this I’ll come after you and reopen your face up
.’
Pienaar grinned and closed the connection
.

Code

Layla swore quietly at the computer, digging deep into her reservoir of Mexican insults for the vilest descriptions she could think of. The small cubicle in one of MIT’s Cloud facilities near a new industrial compound outside Boston felt stifling, the grey plastic walls threatening to close in on her. DeepOmega had frozen again, and now she’d need to wait for five minutes before she could try with the second random-generated code. It was a fucking nightmare.

The first part of the download had been quite smooth, as Walker had predicted. The access portals were easy to navigate, down into the unlock screens buried beneath a couple of fake searches. And the software had flowed into the storage driver without a hitch, faster than she expected. But she had been stuck on the second part for over an hour, bouncing off a couple of number-algorithms that should have been straightforward to bypass. Should have, according to Scott.

Layla sank back in her chair, trying to keep the frustration at bay. She forced her mind back to their tests through the night, struggling to relive the scene as accurately as she could.
Concentrate, bitch
. They were sitting on the bed, two laptops next to each other. Walker clicked on the second window to the right, and input a string of numbers. She glanced back to her notes, making sure she had it. Then he quickly shifted to a black-and-white code screen, typing a question. The answer materialized somewhere else, on a tiny corner-icon, a sort of inverted arrow that she needed to drag…

Layla swore again. She couldn’t remember.
Fuck
.
What am I going to do now?
In his paranoia, DM had picked the most secure Cloud facility in the US. The building was screened, with no connectivity to the outside world beside its own massive cables. Mobile phones were disabled, and if you left the room you couldn’t come back for forty-eight hours. Walker would kill her – he needed the code, fast.

The computer beeped, ready to let her try again. A message flashed on the screen in capital yellow letters: THIS IS YOUR LAST ATTEMPT. IF YOU FAIL TO FOLLOW THE CORRECT PROCEDURE THIS WINDOW WILL LOCK FOR TWENTY-FOUR HOURS. Layla’s head dropped, and she desperately wished for a cigarette. Or Scott. Or a miracle. Forcing herself to focus, she tried to go back in time again, with more clarity. The little corner icon… where the hell…?

YES!

The bloody arrow needed to be trashed, of all things. And then her second hard-coded formula should work. Holding her breath, Layla went through the procedure carefully, rechecking her notes, making sure there were no mistakes. After minutes that seemed to last forever the black background inverted and shuddered, folding onto itself. Random lights flickered on and off, before the download screen appeared in all its stark beauty.
I did it
. She thought Walker would be proud of her. She certainly was, for once.

Sprague watched the whore leave the MIT building, still carrying the heavy bag she had gone in with. He turned the ignition and his Toyota grunted into life as he waited for her to get in a cab. The Corolla
–
possibly the most common car in the US
–
was the perfect surveillance vehicle. He was certain she wouldn’t notice it in Boston’s traffic, or anywhere else. He reversed out of the parking bay as the whore climbed into a yellow taxi, following a couple of vehicles behind, all the way onto the I-90 that would take them to Logan Airport
.

The heavy traffic would slow her down and Sprague smiled, pressing a speed-dial key on his phone. It rang twice before the team-leader answered
.

‘
Talk to me
.’

‘
She’s done
.’
Sprague hated using extra words, if he could avoid it. His voice was too high, almost girlish, he thought
.

‘
Okay. Where is the bitch going?
’

‘
Back to the airport, I guess
.’

‘
Makes sense. Follow her into Departures and check that she gets on the direct flight she’s booked for. Someone will pick her up in LA
.’

‘
Uh uh
.’
Sprague grunted and turned his attention back to the road, concentrating on the taxi ahead
.

Walker sipped his coffee, glancing at the storage driver he had secured to the passenger seat. He
was driving back towards John Wayne Airport to pick Layla up, before they could leave Los Angeles and go to ground somewhere small and safe. He suppressed a yawn, the fading light playing tricks with his tired eyes. He’d been working almost non-stop for the past twenty hours, first preparing Layla and then simulating scenarios and events and watching DeepShare crunch numbers for the ambush on Frankel Schwartz. Prepping and downloading a copy of the Omega code out of Stanford’s mainframes had proved a simple but tedious process, but at least he had been able to use the time to perfect his scheme. Deep finally showed high probabilities of success, especially if they moved fast. Now he needed Mosha to prepare the terrain, and start shorting Frankel’s stock and bonds in size. Smoke signals for all the hedge funds and computers out there.

Walker’s phone beeped and he checked the message: ‘All done, L.’

He sighed, relieved, and lit a cigarette. His thoughts wandered for a while until a car honked and he swerved just in time, realising he was crossing into the opposite lane. He cursed himself and slowed down even further, finding a rest-stop to pull over and take a short break. He exhaled and sat back, still shaking with adrenaline. With the plan about to kick into high gear, he forced himself to relax a little and let his thoughts linger on the future for a second. If it worked, maybe there would be…

The rumble of a large truck shook him out of his reverie and Walker finished his coffee, lighting another cigarette. He breathed in the crispy sea air and considered his phone – with the entire software in their hands, he was at last ready to call Mosha.

Let’s light the fuse
.

The Serb must have been wondering what the hell had happened to him, and why there had been no further progress. Walker dialled from memory, a slow grin spreading on his lips as he waited.

‘About time, you son-of-a-bitch.’ Mosha’s voice was coarse from sleep. ‘Do you even know what time it is here?’

‘I’m guessing around four in the morning.’

‘Yeah.’

‘I thought you might be in a hurry.’

‘I’ve been shitting my pants, that’s what.’ Mosha mumbled something in Italian, probably to his wife. ‘Give me a minute…’

‘Sure.’

After a few seconds the voice came back on the line, all traces of sleep vanished. ‘So?’

‘Has Hackernym been in touch with the info?’

‘Yes.’ Mosha exhaled. ‘Amazing stuff.’

‘Frankel’s books are filled with Southern European stocks and bonds. Italy, Spain – they’ve gone all-in, a massive bet.’

‘Madness. But the market is very calm at the moment.’

‘Not for long. Deep is certain that our brand new Italian PM, Rossini, will manage to push through a public vote on the Euro membership.’

‘Seriously?’ Mosha sounded uncertain. ‘My analysts think it’s less than a one-in-four probability, for now.’

‘Fire them. It will happen, and fast – in the next few weeks, maybe. Then Frankel’s trades will crap out on the possibility of Italy breaking the Euro.’

‘They’ll never get enough yay votes in the ballot, Yours.’

‘Of course not, but it doesn’t really matter. Once Rossini makes the announcement, Hackernym will go public with the Frankel files. Welsh will get arrested, and Friedman. At least three more big shots on the board, the CEO and more senior managers will have to resign. And a few hours later their secret portfolios are going get published as well. What do you think will follow?’

Mosha grunted. ‘When they sense the blood, a lot of hedge funds will start shorting whatever Frankel Schwartz needs to sell. Run the market against them.’

Walker’s voice dropped lower, an edge of nastiness in it. ‘Indeed. And their stock will crack. Frankel’s capital is going to get slaughtered, and they won’t be able to raise more. Certainly not quickly enough.’

‘Like Lehman Brothers.’

‘Exactly. With their shares dropping to zero, they’ll be finished. You can close your short, clean up and load your books with cheap Southern European stuff in the frenzy. You buy a lot of Italian bonds, in a very public way, showing great faith in your adopted land. Deep is certain that the country won’t leave the Euro after all – markets will bounce back, you’ll make a fortune on the return to normality and look like a hero to the Italian powers-that-be.’

‘A good scenario. What if it doesn’t work?’

‘It will.’

Mosha sighed, his voice suddenly tired. ‘Maybe. But as I told you in Siena, I must see the
DeepShare code before I start shorting in size and alerting the market that something might be amiss with Frankel. I need to have my quants run it. Your word is one thing, but numbers are better. The trade is too big.’

Walker had expected this, and didn’t flinch. ‘That’s fine. I have the whole code with me now, on storage drives. But they have to be physically delivered.’

‘When can you get it to me?’

‘I can’t fly for a few days, and I shouldn’t take it out of the States myself, anyway. It’s too dangerous.’

‘Are you in the US? I’m about to zip to New Mexico on business. We could meet there, at the old place.’ He paused for a few seconds as keyboard clicks echoed. ‘Tomorrow night, five in the morning.’

Walker thought hard, his tired brain rushing back through time. ‘Seriously?’

‘Why not? It will be empty.’