Philips realized he was right.

The general cleared his throat. "I need to report back to the Pentagon."

Philips turned to the deputy director. He nodded. She called after the general. "There's more, sir."

"Let's hear it."

"I detected something unusual emanating from the networks of Daemon-infected companies. It's a pulse-an IP beacon of sorts. The tech industry calls these 'heartbeats.' This one consists of a lengthy burst of packets issuing from TCP port 135 at a predictable interval and bit length. Once we noticed the beacon was present at infected companies, we started looking for it elsewhere on the Internet. We found it echoing all over. That's how we estimate that thirty-eight hundred corporations have been compromised. Some of those companies might not even know they're infected yet."

The general was nonplussed. "What's the purpose of this 'IP beacon'?"

"That was the question. We first thought it might be a signal to indicate a company was a Daemon host. But then the signal wouldn't need to be so long-and each burst is a pretty long stream of data. It's always identical for a single company, but never the same between two different companies. And all companies project it in a sequence-like a chain. A pulse from Company A is sent to Company B, then from Company B to Company C, and so on until we start back at Company A again. Stranger still, when our infiltration attempt caused one company to be destroyed, another beacon appeared at a new company to take its place, and it exactly matched the beacon that was lost."

She paused. "That's when I first suspected this was a multipart message."

"The companies are communicating with each other?"

"No. They're communicating to us."

The general weighed what that meant. He regarded Philips with something akin to dread. "What are they saying?"

"The message was encoded with a 128-bit block cipher. It took us weeks to decrypt-and that was on Cold Iron.The good news is that, besides the Japanese and maybe the Chinese, it will take other nations years to decrypt, so we're convinced that Sobol intended it for us. When we assembled the constituent pieces from all the beacons at all the companies, we discovered a single, very large GNU compressed file. When we extracted the package contents, we found two things: an API and an MPEG video file."

"What's an API?"

"It's an application programming interface-rules for controlling a process. It's basically a guide for communicating with-and possibly controlling-the Daemon."

"Good lord! Why would Sobol give us that?"

"I think it's a trap, sir."

"What sort of control is it saying it will give us?"

"We've only begun our analysis, but the most significant function we've discovered is in the Daemon's Ragnorok class library. It's a function named Destroy. It accepts a country code and a tax ID as arguments. We believe that invoking it destroys all the data in the target company."

The general thought about this. "My God…why would he give that to us?"

"We don't know yet."

"You said there was a video. What did the video contain?"

Philips took a deep breath. "Something you need to carry up the chain of command."

In the boardroom of building OPS-2B, the group of agency directors sat arrayed around a broad mahogany conference table. The tension was thick as ominous looks passed from one director to the next. Their host opened the emergency meeting.

NSA: "Gentlemen, you are all aware of the gravity of the current situation. I've brought in representatives from both Computer Systems Corporation and its subsidiary, EndoCorp, to provide additional technical expertise in this matter. These are the same folks who built the FBI's new case management system. They are cleared UMBRA, so we may speak freely. Some of you have already worked together at NBP-1."

Both representatives gave dour nods. They were in their forties and looked more conservative than the window mannequins in the FBI gift shop.

NSA: "What you're about to see is a matter of the utmost secrecy. Were this information to be made public, there is every likelihood that the world economy would falter." He let it sink in. "A-Group has decrypted a video message from Matthew Sobol."

An animated buzz spread through the room. He waited until it died down.

NSA: "We're going to screen that video. Watch it carefully, and we'll discuss it afterward. Lights, please."

The lights dimmed, and a plasma screen set into the wall glowed to life. In a moment Matthew Sobol appeared in high-definition color. The image was so clear it seemed as if a window had opened in the side of the somber boardroom. Sobol stood outdoors, in the sun on high ground overlooking the ocean. He was dressed in khakis and a pressed linen shirt. He looked normal, healthy, the breeze tossing his hair.

Sobol betrayed no emotion. He stared into the camera for several moments before speaking. "They built a twenty-trillion-dollar house of cards. Then they told you to guard it. And they call me insane."

Sobol started to walk along the cliff's edge. The camera followed him, Steadicam-like, in medium close-up. "Technology. It is the physical manifestation of the human will. It began with simple tools. Then came the wheel, and on it goes to this very day. Civilizations rise and fall based on technological innovation. Bronze falls to iron. Iron falls to steel. Steel falls to gunpowder. Gunpowder falls to circuitry." Sobol looked toward the camera again. "For those among you who don't understand what's happening, let me explain: the Great Diffusion has begun-an era when the nation state dissolves. Technology will cause this. As countries compete for markets in the global economy, diffusion of high technology will accelerate. It will result in a diffusion of power. And diffusion of power will make countries an ineffective organizing principle. At first, marginal governments will fail. Larger states will not be equipped to intercede effectively. These lawless regions will become breeding grounds for international crime and terrorism. Threats to centralized authority will multiply. Centralized power will be defenseless against these distributed threats. You have already experienced the leading edge of this wave."

Sobol stopped walking and gazed longingly out at the ocean. In a moment he turned to the camera again.

"My Daemon is not your enemy. And thankfully it cannot be stopped. By anyone or anything. It is neither good nor evil. It is like fire, and it will burn those who do not learn to use it. It will burn the enemies of reason. It will burn the hypocrites and the fools. Use the tools I've given you, and the Daemon will become a valuable resource. Or, if you prefer, don't. Remember that the Daemon is now firmly established throughout the world. Other cultures will use these tools, even if you do not."

He stared straight into the camera. "There will be violence soon. It will shock you with its scope and ferocity. Don't waste your time interceding. It isn't directed at you. It is directed at other parasites in the network.

"Distributed daemons are a foregone conclusion in the coming world. You should befriend this one. Because the next daemon might not be so friendly. And, unlike your current leaders, my Daemon can protect you from your enemies."

The video ended, and the lights came up.

Everyone looked suddenly haggard.

CIA: "Jumping Jesus…"

NSA: "Gentlemen, you've seen the devil himself, and now we need to figure out what to do about him."

CIA: "Forget him. What can we do to stop his Daemon?"

DARPA: "We need to destroy the Daemon's darknet, that's what we need to do. This message is just propaganda. Another misdirection."

CSC: "Destroying the Daemon will require a coordinated cyber attack on numerous corporate data systems. An attack unprecedented in scale-a digital D-Day."