Threat Level

by William Christie

  But before the master chief let that happen, he had his own little talk with Petty Officer First Class Lee Troy.

  “We’ve never had a mixed army-navy team,” Goldbrook informed him. “So everyone wants this to work, you read me?”

  “Yes, Master Chief.” Troy had learned early in his career that there was only one acceptable response when the command master chief was giving you the word.

  “Don’t get fooled by Ed Storey,” Goldbrook warned. “A lot of people hear that down-home accent and take him for a dumb shit kicker. And he likes people to do that. But he’s got a master’s in psychology. All done at night, when he was with operational units.”

  “Is he going to mind-fuck me?” Troy asked.

  “Only if you need to be mind-fucked,” Goldbrook said, hoping he was making his point.

  “Okay. I read you, Master Chief.” Troy paused. “All those Delta guys are real smart.” The SEALs regarded Delta as the Poindexters of the special operations community, while Delta paid the SEALs the hollow compliment of being “real studs,” implying they were more endowed with brawn than brains.

  “Don’t get fooled by that, either,” said Goldbrook. “Storey did Desert Storm and Panama as a young troop with the First Ranger Battalion. Then the Fifth Special Forces Group before he got invited to Delta selection. He’s been to every dance except Mogadishu, and did a three-year exchange tour with the British Special Air Service. When he got selected he was the youngest master sergeant in the army.” He paused for emphasis. “There’s a lot of good operators around. But there’s no one better at low-visibility operations and low-visibility infiltration than Storey. The CIA makes him an offer every year. Keep your eyes and ears open, and you won’t get a better learning opportunity. You still reading me?”

  “Yes, Master Chief.”

  If Goldbrook had any reservations about how a black SEAL with a down-easter Yankee accent was going to get along with a southern redneck soldier, he didn’t express them. “Just one more thing, Troy.”

  “Yes, Master Chief?”

  “Try not to act too weird.”

  Troy didn’t seem surprised to be hearing that. “Yes, Master Chief.”

  Storey was waiting outside Goldbrook’s office. Troy understood why he was Mr. Low Visibility. The kind of unremarkable face that didn’t stick in your mind. Brown hair that was running to salt and pepper. Just shy of six feet tall and lean. Average. As they shook hands, Troy said, “Good to see you again, Top.” Military slang for a master sergeant.

  Not inappropriate, especially since, like the elite military special operations units, no one worked in a uniform. Jeans, khakis, polo shirts, and short-sleeve shirts were the order of the day. But Storey replied firmly, “Ed.”

  “Okay, Ed,” said Troy, pleased by the informality.

  “You get used to calling me Top, you’re going to call me that at the wrong time. So don’t use it again.”

  Troy halted their walk across the office. “Men in Black, right? You’re Tommy Lee Jones, and I’m Will Smith?”

  Storey didn’t change expression. “Who’s Will Smith?”

  They stared at each other for a moment; then Troy said, “Okay, Ed.”

  The only clue to Storey’s mood was a slight crinkling of amusement at the corners of his eyes. You never had to kick a special operator in the ass. You usually had to hold him back by the belt. He liked a little attitude. And Troy had just the right look. A SEAL who didn’t look like a SEAL, just what the doctor ordered. About five feet eight and that baby face, he even looked a little soft, though Storey knew there was no such thing as a soft SEAL.

  They continued across the office. The cubicles, desks, chairs, computers, and phones were all out of the government supply catalog. Other than the occasional family photo on a desk, there were few traces of individuality anywhere. Which wasn’t unusual for military offices. In that culture everyone moved on to a different job every three years—everything you packed in and put up only had to be taken down and packed out. And this office in particular was one that people didn’t expect to be spending too much time in.

  They ended up at a back room that had been converted to equipment storage.

  “Just a few assault-specific items to add to your issue kit,” said Storey.

  “All right,” Troy said. “The James Bond shit.”

  The technician had it all ready, along with the custody card for Troy to initial and sign.

  Troy picked up the Iridium satellite phone and began playing with it. “No encryption package?”

  “Businessmen carry satellite phones,” said Storey. “They don’t carry satellite phones with encryption sleeves.”

  Troy moved on to a top-of-the-line Personal Data Assistant. “Metal-cutting laser?”

  “Nope, just a GPS, and a better camera in case you need to snap some documents. You’ll keep cover files and a fake address book—but with real numbers in it—so cops and customs can take a look at them. But if anyone tries to access your secure files and programs without your password, the whole unit wipes itself clean. This has the crypto on it. Serial cable links it to the phone.”

  “What crypto?” Troy asked.

  “Pretty Good Privacy.”

  “Really?”

  “We don’t want the NSA reading our traffic either.” The National Security Agency, the communications interceptors and code breakers of the intelligence community, supplied all communications encryption equipment to the government and military. They also added back doors to everything so they could listen in. “That PDA is your most important piece of gear.”

  “No notebook computer?”

  “You can’t carry a notebook around with you all the time,” said Storey. “And wherever you leave it, someone can get at it, crack it, or slip a bug inside. The phone and PDA never leave your body.”

  Troy locked back the slide of the Glock Model 26 pistol and peered into the chamber. The entire handgun nearly fit into the palm of his hand. “I thought you D-boys were queer for .45s.”

  “We are, but it’s hard to find .45 ammo in the rest of the world. Nine millimeter is everywhere.”

  “You think you could walk into a store in Egypt and buy yourself a box of ammo?”

  “No,” said Storey. “I think you could hit a cop in the back of the head with your pistol and take his rounds. If worse comes to worse.”

  “Get some,” Troy muttered. He picked up a small black cylinder, only three inches long. “Look at this little baby.”

  “Gemtech Aurora sound suppressor. Uses urethane wipes, like washers. A lot less messy than grease as a silencing medium. You change to a new pack of wipes after every two magazines.”

  “Quiet?” said Troy, screwing the little can onto the specially threaded barrel of his Glock.

  “Very.” Storey handed him a package. “Null USH shoulder holster. The best. Wear it under your shirt—the holster won’t print through, and the polymer material won’t soak up your sweat. I’ve got a tailor who’ll alter the cut on all your shirts and put Velcro on, so you can rip them open without losing all your buttons.”

  Troy tried the holster. The Glock slid neatly into the polymer pocket, which also covered the trigger. But the pistol wouldn’t come out. “Okay, I give up.”

  “Get a sold grip, twist, then pull.”

  “Sweet.”

  “Try not to shoot a hole in your armpit,” said Storey.

  “I’d never hear the end of that, would I?”

  “No, you wouldn’t.” Storey continued, “When we’re at the tailor we’ll also get you a couple of business suits.”

  “Black?”

  “Or dark blue or gray.”

  “Sunglasses?”

  Storey allowed himself his first small smile. “Like businessmen wear. Number-one rule: always live your cover. You’ll draw passports, documents, and credit cards according to the mission. Diplomatic for overt, fake for covert. Not even the diplomatic will have your real name.”

  “That’s it?”<
br />
  Storey put emphasis into his statement. “All you really need is your brain.”

  “I’ll bring it.”

  As they moved Troy into the small, two-desk cubicle, Storey reached into one of his drawers and pulled something out. “There’s always one more thing.” He handed Troy a coffee mug. “Everyone in assault has one. Sergeant First Class Green’s daughter is a potter.”

  Troy checked out the mug. Two clean-cut young Americans in business suits—both white, Troy instantly noted—standing on the front steps of a house. A worried-looking Arab wearing a kaffiyeh headdress over his face in terrorist fashion was peering at them from around his door. “The Missionaries?”

  “Just a little in-house nickname. We travel around the world spreading the good word.”

  “And what good word is that?” Troy asked.

  “Don’t fuck with Uncle Sam. By the way, the mug doesn’t leave the building.”

  “What’s next?”

  “We’ll get you familiar with the PDA and the rest of the equipment first. Then we’ll work on tactics. We won’t get much time before we have to go operational.”

  “Storey’s Rules,” said Troy.

  “You heard about them, eh?” Storey said, annoyed. “People have big mouths.”

  “How many rules are there?”

  “A few.”

  “They work?”

  “I’m still here.”

  The PDA took most of the morning. Storey was relieved to find that he never had to repeat anything.

  Then they turned to the desktop computers and In-telink, the intelligence community’s own highly classified and highly secure Internet. After, that is, Troy signed more security declarations than he’d ever seen at one time.

  “Whenever you start thinking about how much fun it would be to do some surfing with this,” said Storey, “your next thought ought to be how much fun Leavenworth would be.”

  “I figured they log everyone who uses this.”

  “Yeah, but you know how it is. If you were spying for the Russians they’d never find you. But if you were just fucking around they’d squash you like a bug. It’s almost worthless when it comes to current intelligence. But the research is where you make your money.”

  “What’s next?”

  Storey liked that. He glanced at his watch. “Lunch. I’ll give you three choices. We can eat, PT, or go to the Secret Service range and try out your new pistole.”

  “Let’s go to the range. I like to PT after work, to cool myself down.”

  Storey was examining him again. “So do I.”

  They were just getting up when Storey’s phone rang. He listened, and said, “Great, thanks.” Then to Troy, “This is good. You needed to meet Beth Royale, and she’s on her way up.”

  “Who’s Beth Royale?”

  “FBI. Counterterrorism Division.”

  “Great. One of those.”

  “Beth’s not your typical special agent.”

  “That’ll be a change.”

  “Be patient when she sits down. She’s going to want to talk about Rick Silva first.”

  Troy gave him a questioning look, but Storey was already standing up. Initially puzzled, Troy looked around for officers before a hard glance from Storey put him on his feet.

  Beth was wearing a dark suit, flats, and her hair back. “Hi, Ed.”

  Storey said, “Beth, I want you to meet my new partner, Lee Troy.”

  They shook hands. “Nice to meet you, Lee.”

  “Likewise.”

  “Maine?” she said.

  “That’s right. Little town near Camden.”

  “Just outside of Boston,” said Beth.

  They both smiled at each other.

  As they were sitting down, Beth said, “Ed, how’s Ricky doing?”

  Troy’s head whipped around to look at Storey, who ignored him. “He’s paralyzed from the waist down, Beth. It’s permanent.”

  Troy was expecting tears, but all she did was let out some breath in the form of a grunt and say, “I was afraid of that.”

  Storey said, “His first thing he wanted to know from the physical therapist was sex techniques for the paraplegic.”

  “That’s the Enrique I know.”

  “He wanted me to tell you he liked your chocolate truffles a hell of a lot more than everyone else’s flowers.”

  “Ricky’s not a flower guy.”

  Troy was sitting through this exchange feeling like the outsider.

  Storey picked up on that, getting back to business. “What brings you over in person, Beth?”

  “The dead guy in Olongapo.”

  Storey’s only reaction was to ask, “Which one?”

  “The hostage taker,” said Beth. Then, after a hitch, “The black male.”

  A glance at Troy. Troy wasn’t exactly unfamiliar with white people getting uncomfortable around him. That was their problem; he wasn’t in the habit of offering any reassurance to make them feel better. But something made him look over at Storey. Storey didn’t look uncomfortable. Storey didn’t look like anything. Storey was watching him.

  Beth flipped through some papers. “In your report you said his accent was American.”

  “That’s right,” said Storey.

  “Well, he was,” said Beth. “Karim Abdul-Amin, formerly Kenneth Livingston of Detroit.”

  “That’s not good,” said Storey. Terrorist networks using non-Arab Muslim converts were the universal nightmare.

  Troy broke in. “Ex-con?”

  “That’s right,” said Beth. “Burglary, drugs, assault. Filipino wife, lots of trips back and forth.”

  “Abu Sayyaf?” said Storey. “Or Jemaah Islamiya?”

  The first was a native Filipino terrorist group. Founded in the early 1990s with the help of Osama Bin Laden and the goal of creating an Islamic state in the Philippines. The group lost its religious focus once they found out just how profitable it was to kidnap for ransom and hire out as general-purpose thugs. Lately they’d rediscovered their faith after being ordered by Al Qaeda to stop kidnapping foreigners because it brought down too much American military heat.

  Jemaah Islamiya was an Indonesian-based terrorist group that acted as Al Qaeda’s surrogate in Asia. They also ran training camps in the southern Philippines.

  “Neither,” said Beth. “The Rajah Solaiman Movement.”

  “The what?” said Troy.

  “Got me on that one, too,” said Storey.

  “Formed in 2002,” said Beth. “Unlike the Moros or Sayyaf they want the whole country to be Islamic, not just Mindanao.”

  “I’d think there are a few too many Catholics for that,” said Troy.

  “When God gets dragged in it doesn’t have to make sense,” said Storey.

  “They claim the whole Philippines was Moslem before the Spanish arrived,” said Beth. “They recruit Christians, then turn them into militants.”

  “How many Moslem converts can there be in the P.I.?” Troy asked.

  Beth turned some more pages. “Quarter of a million or so. Mostly men who worked as migrant laborers in the Middle East, then came home.”

  “Where’s this group’s money come from?” Storey asked.

  “Abu Sayyaf,” said Beth. “Saudi charities. We’re working a case in Detroit, and we’re looking for possible connections. The prisoner you took is caught up in the interrogation backlog at Bagram. We’d like to get him bumped up to the head of the line.”

  “I’ll talk to the colonel and see if we can create some pressure from our end,” said Storey.

  “Thanks, Ed,” said Beth.

  “President’s making a trip to Asia in the fall,” Storey remarked.

  Troy took note of how he just threw it out into the air like that, then added, “That may end up being as smart as going to Dallas in 1963.”

  “It’s on everyone’s mind,” said Beth. “Ed, if we find any links I’ll let you know.”

  “I know you will, Beth.”

  “I owe you another
one,” she said.

  Troy also took note of Storey’s shy smile, because it was so out of character.

  “I’ll put it in my little book,” Storey told her.

  Beth rose and shook Troy’s hand. “Nice to meet you, Lee.”

  “Same here,” Troy replied. He then watched Storey’s eyes follow her from the office. “Not your usual FBI: act like insurance salesmen; take but don’t give.”

  “Beth takes no shit, so I’d advise you not to give her any. Smart, too. Columbia Law School.”

  “What’s she doing in the Bureau, then?”

  “Looking for a little action, I guess. Why did you want to be a SEAL?”

  “It wasn’t because the law bored me.”

  Changing the subject, Storey said, “Where did you say you grew up?”

  “Ogansquogg, Maine.”

  “You like it?”

  “No.”

  “Joined the navy to get out of there?”

  “That’s right,” said Troy, hardening up a little because he couldn’t see where the conversation was going. In the military, that usually meant you were about to take some shit.

  “Ever going back?”

  “No.”

  Storey paused. “Well, I grew up in that same town in West Virginia.”

  Troy cracked a smile, but changed the subject right back. “Beth’s a pretty good-looking woman. If you like redheads. Little too much booty for me, though.”

  Storey rose to the bait. “You’re crazy. She’s built like a real woman.”

  “Go for it,” Troy said triumphantly.

  If Storey was annoyed at being trapped, it only surfaced in the look of respect he gave Troy. “Right now I need another relationship like I need another marriage.”

  “How many you had?”

  “Marriages? Two.”

  “Nothing wrong with that, if you’re into marriage.”

  “Yeah, well, I need another one like I need another Purple Heart.”

  “How many of those you got?”

  “Three. I’m better at getting wounded than I am at getting married.”

  4

  A city of fourteen million was easy to hide in. It was even easier if it was the southern port city of Karachi, Pakistan. The fourteen-million figure was just a guess. Fifty years ago Karachi had been home to only a hundred thousand. In 1981 the census came in at five million. In 1994 they figured ten million. The bottom line was that not much urban planning had been done in the interval.