All The Big Ones Are Dead

by Christopher A. Gray

  “The asset is a Columbia University professor. An advanced mathematician named John Logan, age 32. He is an expert in advanced encryption, decryption, data encoding and decoding and a whole lot more. This is a guy who is probably on track to nail down a Nobel Prize in the not too distant future. He’s brilliant by any measure. He is also, like a lot of advanced academics, a creature of very consistent habit. Unlike the typical sorts of creatures we usually track or protect, he is scary-aware of his surroundings. His mind and his senses are not clouded by a drug habit, booze, hookers or a gambling habit. The absent-minded professor is a myth, so block it out of your thinking right now. Dr. Logan is deeply involved in a heavy-duty post-doctoral research project that has drawn the attention of everyone and everything from the U.S. government, the UK government, NASA, the NSA, the CIA and every other three-letter combo you can think of. He is serious business. He is also a dweeb.”

  That got a chuckle.

  “Good guy or bad guy?” one of the team members asked.

  “Oh, he’s a good guy,” Diane replied, “and despite his professional association with all the three letter words he’s a civilian asset. What the working group has planned, and what you’re going to implement over the next two days, or longer if it goes the way we hope it will, is the protection of John Logan. Under no circumstances is anyone associated with Logan or with us to become even vaguely aware of what we’re doing. Not until the villains we’re after are safely locked away in a deep hole that is, and maybe not even then. This is important.”

  “That sounds ominous,” one of the female team members spoke up. “A bit too emphatic. I think we know our security brief. It also sounds as though we’re being admonished about maintaining tight operational security. Kind of unnecessary, don’t you think? Makes me think there’s an internal leak somewhere.”

  “It’s necessary. A civilian, a former illegal ivory and rhino horn dealer who’d gone straight years ago, alerted us to a major contact a couple of weeks ago. His name was William Ling. There’s a brief on him in your files. He’d become a quiet old widower, in Hong Kong, with a quiet little business, and he ended up in bloody little pieces just for attempting to make contact with Superintendent DeCourcey. This guy Logan is an asset too. Not just an average asset, though. He could be the key to cracking open a billion dollar global smuggling operation. And he’s a civilian who is never going to find out how great the danger really is, because we’re going to do our best to keep him insulated from it.” Gauss nodded at Diane to continue.

  “You’ve all got either Classified or Secret classifications in your personnel files from previous liaison work with the FBI. We’re stepping this up, though. To drive home the point on this operation, you’re going to be signing Top Secret classification non-disclosure agreements before you leave this room today. That means program-level access only. The people in this room are the only people you talk to about this task force. It’s almost the same form of security restriction as the Department of Defense top secret/sensitive compartmented information rating. We’re really not screwing around here. Logan is extremely valuable. You say nothing to your mum, your lover, your therapist: you don’t even talk to yourself in the mirror about Logan.”

  There was a moment of silence in the room as everyone thought about that for a moment. TS/SCI meant that nobody other than the team in the room could ever have the knowledge that the team were so much as associated with each other, let alone working together.

  “Do we have any other surveillance support?” The question was asked by one of the three women on the team. Diane nodded at the woman and tilted her head toward her as if she was about to ask a question.

  “Sorry, Agent Linders,” the woman said in response with a slight smile, “I’m Detective Anne Ryder, NYPD major case squad. I also spent four years with NYPD counterterrorism and intelligence. You know my boss, Deputy Commissioner Wechsler.”

  “I know him,” Diane replied. “What’s your concern, Detective Ryder? Personnel or electronics?”

  “Electronics and other hardware mainly.”

  “Mainly, no,” Diane said firmly, looking into Ryder’s eyes and then directly into the eyes of the other five watcher team members. “This is going to be mostly old-school. Eyes, ears and shoe leather. This operation is unique in that we’re going to be keeping the asset’s interaction with us strictly at the local operational level. That’s key. No senior directors. No casual introductions. We’re all going to be in civvies, and we’re going to be staying that way. Operational security at this level means nobody outside this group ever finds out what we’re doing or who we’re protecting. Ever.”

  Detective Ryder glanced over at one of the other team members, a big guy who looked to be about six feet two or three inches tall and about two hundred and forty pounds. Detective Ryder herself was at least five feet ten inches tall, and well built. They both looked like they could take care of themselves, and the quick glance they exchanged spoke volumes about other things.

  Diane nodded at the man to speak up.

  “I’m Detective Barretto. Call me Jay. Major crime squad, NYPD, same as Detective Ryder.”

  “What’s your question?”

  “It was going to be about recording methods. Video, audio and so on. But if this is a rolling, high security detail? Is that it? I mean, this sounds like we’ll be on high alert, rolling heavy, and doing Secret Service-type self-support operations. I’m here because I want in, but I’m not exactly well-practiced in this sort of, um, tradecraft.”

  Diane smiled and glanced over at Gauss. He just nodded his head for her to continue.

  “Actually, Detective—Jay—you are. You all are.” Diane looked around at everyone. “You just don’t realize it yet. And I said it was mostly old school, not totally old school. When the asset is out of our sight, say, in the bowels of his labs, we’ll have surveillance access through the university’s security system and phone taps. We have to be sure the asset doesn’t arbitrarily run his mouth. Give me half an hour to lay it out for you all here.”

  “Agent Linders,” a medium height, dark haired, slim woman spoke up. “I’m Detective Maria Ricci, also NYPD. That’s my partner, Murray Rosenberg,” she said pointing over her right shoulder. “What’s the play here?”

  “The simple answer is short and sweet,” Linders replied, looking over the team. “We’re going to protect the only asset in the United States whom we hope can solve a highly complicated communications encryption problem. Logan is basically a mathematical genius. I am going to make contact using a fully rigged alias so that the genius who is capable of solving the problem will be drawn into figuring it out for us.”

  “What!? Really?” agent Kwok said abruptly. Chantal Kwok and her partner Eli Turner were both agents on loan from Customs & Border Protection. Kwok was just below average height, but her hair was cut short and slightly spiked in a deliberately messy style that made her medium frame look taller. She also wore tight slacks and a very well-tailored jacket that emphasized an attractive body. It was her eyes that made you look first though—black as an unlit basement, unblinking, and unwavering when she was looking hard at you and waiting for an answer. “Seems like a lot of unusual effort for a problem we could walk over to the Columbia math department and pay Logan, to work out. Is he a security risk?”

  “Jesus, Chant,” Agent Turner spoke up, gesturing at one of the tables covered with biographical information and photos of John Logan. “Do the reading, girl. Nobody is supposed to know the asset is working on anything besides university projects.”

  Kwok didn’t miss a beat. “Uh-huh,” she said, somewhat set back but still persistent, “I read that bit. So what’s wrong with a secure approach inside the university? If Ricci is right, that means a leak might exist at Columbia. Seems reasonable to think that being inside will give us a better look.”

  “Let’s continue to keep this simple,” Diane said. She was starting to like the way the team thought. Turning details over in their minds, ex
pressing ideas immediately, no hesitation. “The less you know about why we’re doing this, and the less you know about how we all arrived here in this room today, the better off you’ll be, the safer Logan will be, and the sooner we’ll be able to get started. We’re doing asset protection, not investigation of a suspected security breach.”

  Agent Kwok was staring hard at Diane who met her penetrating look with something just as firm and assured. A second passed and then Kwok just smiled and relaxed. Right at that moment too, Diane wanted to be sure that every team member understood that John Logan was non-expendable and about as vitally important an asset as any one human being could possibly be. She got here assurance a moment later when Kwok and Turner looked over at each other and nodded in agreement.

  They understood. Diane could see it in all their eyes. No resentment, no professional sparring, no unnecessary ego. Serious questions only. They just got it, clearly. They’d challenged her and she given them the answers they needed to hear. This is a good bunch, she thought, genuinely relieved, and this might turn into a great operation.

  When DeCourcey had been hunting for an individual with whom they could consult on the communications problem, he and Diane had met with a regular contact at the EU External Action Service. He’d given them an introduction to one of his contacts at the NSA, a senior analyst working in the Central Security Service doing development and cryptology project management for the Pentagon. He’d pointed them at John Logan. Max Gauss made the same recommendation. It was a stroke of luck that he had studied Logan’s early work.

  DeCourcey and Diane had gotten back in touch with their EAS contact to ask for permission to use Logan. The contact was a dark, dour sort of European agency suit, a Finn named Mustonen, who’d risen to a senior directorship because he was dedicated, smart and never stopped digging for answers. When Diane and DeCourcey had sketched out the general need, Mustonen had almost immediately agreed.

  “Speak with Slava Druvicz at CSS,” Mustonen told them in his typical quiet monotone. “He will give you Logan’s particulars.” Then Mustonen had become even more serious. “Logan is also my guy, and NASA’s guy, and a few others besides. Do not fuck him up. Do not endanger him. Do not leave him with a bullseye painted on his back.”

  It was an unpleasant warning, but DeCourcey and Diane both knew the rules.

  “If you come over to this table,” Diane said, her mind back in the room and pointing at the far end of the table, “I’ll give you your assignment sheets.” The team members walked over to the table and Diane handed each of them a sheet of paper containing individual assignments, numbered like a regular list. The six watchers each read their list and then started comparing them.

  “Memorize the numbers.” Diane said, looking at each of the team members in turn. “When you communicate, do so by referring to the numbers not individuals or a location or method descriptions. We need airtight operational security to protect this asset.”

  “What’s your primary cover?” Ricci asked.

  “I’m a part-time English Lit student,” Diane replied, “back at school because I won an injury insurance settlement.”

  “What are the chances that Logan will initially take to this?” detective Rosenberg said, “I mean to you? I don’t see a workup here on any of his, ah, tastes.” He was rubbing his cheek and obviously doubtful.

  “Murray,” Ricci said seriously, “I don’t think you’d lock yourself away if Diane showed up at your regular table at Mickey’s Diner. You’d be alternately trying to figure out why somebody who looks as good as Diane cared about you, and making appointments to see your therapist.” Rosenberg looked at Ricci just as seriously, but then slowly nodded.

  “The regular contact points depend heavily on the degree to which Logan is a creature of habit,” Detective Barretto said, slowly. “Getting close enough to Logan without being noticed or sensed, with enough stationary time to fall in beside or in front of or behind passers-by in public places in order to proceed under cover means that we need to be really familiar with his habitual locations. We’ll get to know the locations right now, at times when he’s not at any of them.”

  “What’s your question, Detective?” Diane said.

  “How reliable is your intel?” Barretto asked flatly. “For this to work, I mean for our security and protection techniques to work, whatever we work out together, we’ve got to do practice runs in each location. None of them can be the wrong locations. It’s bad enough that we can’t physically cover the asset while he’s inside campus buildings.” They all directed their attention to Diane.

  “The intel is reliable. The working group is excellent and I trust their information. The locations are solid. Logan never varies his schedule. If he surprises us, we will not immediately try to improvise, though. The designated observer for the location or the day will call an abort and the rest of the team will move to the best available close support positions. Whoever is closest to the asset will go into protection mode. If the worst happens and there’s an attack or an approach, we take down whoever is making the approach using our real ID. If it’s just a civilian, we apologize and move on and let Legal take over if the civilian decides to sue. But they won’t get anywhere. Our authorization comes from way too high up. Anyway, this meeting room is home base. It’s ours for as long as we need it, and it’s a long way from Morningside Heights to Tribeca down here. Plenty of room to get good and gone with Logan under wraps if bad guys show up or if Logan gets lost or changes his routine.”

  “Who has electronic monitoring duty once the asset has entered areas we can’t go?”

  “All of us. Turn the page. Monitoring assignments are laid out clearly.”

  “Once I make contact, we’ll be on the security clock 24/7. No breaks. No exceptions. Get squared away with your assigned shifts.”

  Agent Kwok was looking intently at Linders.

  “Question, Agent Kwok?”

  “It occurs to me that there is something missing from the folder,” Kwok said firmly.

  “You’re talking about the total absence of the local threat assessment, yes?” Diane replied.

  “Absolutely. There’s nothing in here about a specific threat, threat potential, an individual threat or a threat from an identifiable group.”

  “You’re right,” Diane said, as the rest of the watchers focused their attention on Diane again. “And that’s the point of all this fuss and bother and high security. We just don’t know. You’re assembled here because we don’t even know if a threat to John Logan actually exists. We don’t know if he’s already being watched or targeted. We don’t even know for a certainty that Logan is not the actual scientist who developed whatever communications encryption has stumped everyone who has tried to crack it so far in the first place.” She ignored Max’s derisive look of ‘Not possible, Diane!’ and continued. Her statement to the team that she trusted the working group’s intel was meant solely to ensure the team members acted confidently. In truth, Diane didn’t trust any intelligence absolutely.

  “We’re not gathering intel through surveillance, like I said before, because when I say that we can’t crack the communications of the few key but lower level players we’ve managed to identify, I mean exactly that. We’ve got a field agent who’s been basically reduced to beating information out of low-level players upstream.”

  “And what are they into, Agent Linders?” Detective Rosenberg asked. “Those low-level upstream players. What are they doing that has drawn so many resources for Interpol? What are they into that has several governments apparently tied up in knots?”

  “That, detective, is a very good question,” Diane replied as she shuffled her own papers together. “I dropped a hint earlier. But it’s not your concern until such time as I find out if there are local players who have connected Logan to anything that Interpol is doing. Even if I only get so much as a vague hint of anything, let alone hard intel, you will hear it from me before anybody. You’ll hear about it even before my boss does. In the
meantime, we all have to be clear that we're tailing Logan but rather protecting him.”

  “Good enough,” Rosenberg said. The rest of the task force made positive noises of assent. Detective Rosenberg had raised a good point though. They’d each sneaked a quick peek at the sheet on William Ling and the gruesome coroner’s photos of his shot up body. Threat assessment was a fundamentally important part of security and protection. Ling’s information basically told them that protecting John Logan would not likely turn out to be a walk in the park.

  “So is this it, or are these locations just the highlights?” Agent Turner asked. “I’m asking if there are other locations we can scout that might suit us better.” It was a perfectly good question that at least a couple of the others were thinking about.

  “No,” Diane said firmly. “As surprising as it is, this is all there is. When I say that Logan is creature of limited habits, I really mean limited. As best the working group can tell, Logan hasn’t ventured north of West 135th Street, south of West 71st Street, west of Riverside Drive or east of Lexington Avenue anytime in the past three years.”

  She looked at the group, received a couple quick nods and a couple smiles.

  “Let’s get to it.”

  Chapter Six

  “Alpha in sight. Walking East on Eighty-fifth. Fifty meters from the door of the coffee shop,” Gauss spoke discreetly while standing in front of a market across the street from the Morningside Bean coffee shop. The sensitive mic in his earpiece, toned to blend with his skin colour, picked up every word while filtering out background noise. Logan was walking at his usual quick pace. Diane Linders was walking towards him from the opposite direction. She was wearing a brown lace dress, faded jean jacket, and a large bead necklace that draped just above her cleavage.