Puppet Master

by Dale Brown

  “They’re going to check it out,” he yelled from below.

  “Porter, where’s that patrol boat?” asked Tolevi.

  “Just pulling even with the cargo ship. Got their lights on them.”

  “They coming for us?”

  “Can’t tell.”

  Tolevi veered away from the landing, heading north at full speed.

  Chelsea guided the drone back in their direction, but the speedboat was pulling steadily away.

  “You’re going to have to slow down so the Nighthawk can catch up,” she told Tolevi.

  “No way,” he answered. “We don’t have time to wait for your toy.”

  “That toy just saved our butts.”

  “We’re not out of trouble yet. I still have a boat north of us.”

  Chelsea was too busy trying to fly the aircraft to see what was going on around her. The speedboat was moving as quickly as it could, very close to the western shore. She caught a glimpse of searchlights off the starboard side.

  “Four miles to open water,” said Tolevi. “Push, pray, or get out of the way.”

  She set the course on auto, which allowed the UAV to continue flying on its own, then selected the infrared image. One of the Russian patrol boats was less than a half mile from the plane, just to the left. She could see two sailors running on the forward deck.

  Then it was past.

  There was another ahead, this one at about two o’clock.

  Painted black and relatively small, the UAV was not only invisible to the radar aboard the patrol boat but difficult for its crew to spot visually as well. And the boat easily drowned out the electric drone of its motor. There was no sign that the boat had spotted the aircraft.

  The vessel grew larger. She could see its profile, long and sleek, like a miniature yacht with a deck gun on top.

  “That second boat, the one still in front of us, it looks like it’s coming in our direction,” she told Tolevi.

  “No shit.”

  Something flashed on the deck.

  “I think they’re firing at us,” she said.

  Tolevi’s heart pounded as a geyser erupted a hundred yards away. When was the last time he’d been fired at?

  Never by a patrol boat.

  Bad time for a first.

  “They stopped ordering us to stop,” yelled White.

  “Get your life jackets on,” answered Tolevi. “Pick out a spot on the shore and swim for it if we go down.”

  At this rate, there was no way the Nighthawk was going to catch up to the speedboat. But the Russian craft, slowing in its turn, was less than a half mile away.

  The bridge was a huge greenhouse atop a sloping superstructure, with large plate-glass windows all around. She could see it plainly in the screen.

  Chelsea nudged the stick until the windows were dead on in the screen. She aimed at the one closest to the bow.

  Another shell whizzed overhead.

  “Typical Russian aim,” snickered Tolevi.

  Chelsea nudged the stick a little higher. The plate-glass window grew large in the screen.

  Then it went black.

  Something flared on the Russian patrol boat. Tolevi glanced in its direction, then continued steering, ducking as close to shore as he dared.

  Two more miles. Two more. Then just north.

  Porter came over and started to pull a life jacket over Tolevi’s head. Tolevi started to resist, then realized what he was doing.

  But there were no other shells.

  “I got this,” he said aloud, sensing they’d made it.

  “Russian is dead in the water,” said White a moment later. “They claim their bridge was hit by a missile.”

  Tolevi looked back at Chelsea.

  “You hit it with the UAV?”

  “Dead on.”

  “Nice,” he told her. “Double ration of vodka at dinner tonight.”

  “I prefer beer,” she told him. “Or better, a Coke.”

  93

  Boston—a short time later

  “They’re past the Russian ships,” said Johansen. “There was an explosion on one of the Russian vessels. Very fortunate.”

  Massina, greatly relieved, got out of his seat. He doubted luck had anything to do with it—more likely, he guessed, they had used one of the UAVs as a weapon.

  Which undoubtedly would have been Chelsea’s doing. So she was meant to be on the mission. And she could take care of herself.

  “Next coms will be when they land,” said Johansen. “There are no Russian vessels between them and the shore. We’ll monitor for air traffic, but all the Russian patrols are based far to the southeast, in Russia; they should be OK.”

  “That’s a relief,” said Massina. “I’m going to check on things. I’ll be back.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  Massina had a mental list of improvements he was going to make if he continued working with the government: Constant real-time communications that could not be detected. Full coverage of the target area to show where any “obstacles” (such as the Russian ships) were located. Some sort of quick reaction force ready to bail operatives out.

  It could all be done with his devices.

  Johnny Givens, who had taken over temporarily as his bodyguard, was waiting outside the box.

  “How’d it go?” asked Johnny.

  And that was another thing—his people would have access to the box. Period.

  “They have a ways to go,” said Massina. “Johnny, you have a clearance from the government, right?”

  “There’s different levels of clearance. They do background checks—”

  “You could pass a CIA clearance check, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “You’re with me when I’m inside from now on. Nobody tells you no.”

  “Great.”

  Massina made his way across the large room to the elevator.

  “You know, I’d rather be out there with them,” said Johnny.

  “You have a long way to go.”

  “Next time.”

  If there is a next time, maybe, thought Massina, but he didn’t say it.

  Borya Tolevi leaned toward the screen, looking at the string of integers and symbols. She had the entire day off from school, which meant she could work here until early afternoon, when Martyak got back from her classes and would be expecting her.

  Borya was working on a defense against application layer attacks similar to what she had used to compromise the ATM networks. In her case, she had used coding that attacked a flaw in a database that left account information intact rather than purging it. The block of instructions in front of her sought to fix that.

  She hadn’t understood everything involved in her original attack; mostly, she had followed a script she’d found on the Internet and made some slight adaptations as she’d gone. Now she saw that fixing the problem was somewhat complicated, a puzzle that forced her to think in metaphors as well as code. The instructions were like keys fitting into locks that had to then disappear without a trace.

  People didn’t do that. Her father was gone, yet so much of him was still present, in her, in others.

  “Have you broken the program yet?” asked Louis Massina.

  Borya jumped.

  “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “How’s Chelsea?” Borya asked.

  “She’s fine. So’s your dad.”

  “Where are they?”

  “Still can’t say. They have you working on the database hacks?”

  “I’m looking at it. It’s pretty involved,” she confessed. “It’s like a college class.”

  “Graduate level,” said Massina. “Keep at it.”

  “Hey, Johnny.” Borya waved at the tall former FBI agent. “You hanging with me tonight?”

  “If I’m on the schedule.” The security people took turns.

  “Mary was wondering when you were coming back,” said Borya. “You should ask her for a date.”

  “Can’t mix work with plea
sure,” said Johnny shyly.

  “Why not?”

  Martyak’s blond curls and ample breasts were a powerful attraction. She was pretty, and before his injury Johnny wouldn’t have hesitated asking her out.

  Now, though . . .

  Johnny followed Massina down the hall to the elevator. Shadowing him inside the building was pretty boring. It did take him everywhere, though; he was really getting to know his way around.

  “You’re looking a little pale,” said Massina as they waited.

  “Yeah.”

  “Tired, too?”

  “Time for the meds.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “I feel like a junkie.”

  “If you want privacy . . .”

  Massina turned his back to him. Johnny reached into his jacket and took out the syringe set. He pulled up his shirt and injected himself, à la a diabetic, as the elevator arrived.

  “Good as new?” asked Massina.

  Never as good as new, thought Johnny. But good enough, and sometimes better.

  94

  Near Berdyans’k—3:00 a.m.

  In the years immediately following the dissolution of the Soviet Union, there were great plans to turn Berdyans’k—or Бердя́нськ, as it was styled in Ukrainian—into a major international tourist area. It had many of the necessary ingredients: a nearby airport, a train hub, a willing workforce, and, most importantly, beautiful seaside beaches and relatively accommodating weather.

  But neither high hopes nor great assets equated to success, and the city never quite fulfilled its boosters’ dreams. Meanwhile, much of the nearby industry, which had scuttled along during the Soviet era, went through hard times, starved of investment.

  The civil war further harmed Berdyans’k. Activity at the harbor was a shadow of what it had been even a year before. The cranes along the western stretch of the piers stood idle, almost lonely in the night.

  All of this meant opportunity for a smuggler. Fewer prying eyes, more hands eager for handouts. While Tolevi had never done any business here, he scanned the quiet docks and warehouses with knowing eyes as they approached.

  Money to be made here. Make a note of it.

  Coffee by the boatload, right on that pier.

  A green light blinked at the far end of the docks, under one of the large cranes ordinarily used to take cargo containers off a ship. Tolevi cut the engines and drifted, wanting to get a good look before committing to the dock. The Russian forces to the south were on high alert, still not entirely sure what had happened or where their foe was. While the radio traffic did not indicate they were searching this far north, there was always the possibility that some overdiligent junior lieutenant would feel the itch to prove himself by mounting an extra watch.

  “That’s them,” said White after flashing the recognition code back.

  “Let’s sit here a second and make sure,” Tolevi told him. “Porter, we got anything out that way?”

  “Only that fishing boat we passed on the way in.”

  Tolevi stepped over to take the glasses. The small boat anchored about a half mile to the southeast bobbed with the waves, a dim light at the fantail. It could easily be a smuggler’s sentry, or just a fisherman who liked spending the night alone on the water.

  Money to be made here.

  Tolevi then went to the starboard side and scanned the dock area and wharf beyond. Two vans were parked next to a building back by the crane.

  His connection.

  “All right, let’s go in,” he said, returning to the helm.

  Chelsea’s stomach riled slightly as she clambered out of the boat to the dock, and she had to step to the side as the others carried the waterproof boxes with the bots and other gear from the cabin to the waiting vans.

  Bozzone waited for her to catch her breath, then nudged her gently to walk with him in front of the vans. Tolevi was standing with the man they met on the dock—“Dan”—whom he seemed to know.

  Tolevi put up his hand to warn them back, then stepped with Dan a few feet away.

  “What are we doing?” Chelsea asked Bozzone.

  “No English.” His voice was barely audible.

  Chelsea rubbed her eyes. Pulling all-nighters in the lab was one thing; pulling them out here was something completely different.

  And yet this didn’t feel like a place of danger, especially after what they’d just been through. It was too quiet.

  They could be back home, or on a vast sound stage, waiting for a movie to be filmed. The sky in the distance, a faint blue between dark black waves and thick clouds, was a painted scrim, shadowed by hidden lights. The sounds of the night—some seabirds, the relentless lapping of water against the docks—were piped in from speakers stashed full circle around the stage.

  Tolevi left the other man and walked toward the vans. He yelled something in Russian or Ukrainian—Chelsea had trouble distinguishing the languages—and the men helping them boarded the vans.

  Chelsea started for the nearest van, but Tolevi stopped her.

  “Our car’s up the road,” he told her.

  “Car?” asked Bozzone.

  “Complications. We have to change our plan. This will be safer for both of you.”

  The butcher’s brother had kept tabs on Olak Urum’s location in the prison with the help of two guards who were close friends of the family, an arrangement the Russian crackdown had failed to end. Earlier in the evening, one of the guards had told him his brother had been moved; Dan had only just been informed before coming to the rendezvous.

  The question was where he’d been moved to. The guards didn’t know, and while the brother had a few ideas, he hadn’t had a chance to check them out.

  Given that, Tolevi had opted not to go to Starobeshevskaya, even though that had been the plan. It was too small a place to risk staying for several days, if it came to that. So they were going to a backup south of Donetsk, about a two-hour drive away. There they would split up.

  “The gear will be on a farm. We’ll stay in a safe house about a mile away,” Tolevi told Chelsea and Bozzone. “It’s more comfortable, and I can make phone calls from there without attracting attention, and our cover story will make more sense. Plus, there are beds. I’m guessing you don’t want to sleep on the floor with the boys.”

  “Might be interesting,” shot back Chelsea.

  “Never at a loss for a comeback, huh?”

  “Are you?”

  “Only when I talk to my daughter.” She’s a lot like you, he thought. But you’re not necessarily as sharp as you think. There’s more to the universe than slinging numbers around.

  They drove in silence for the next hour. Chelsea and Bozzone both nodded off. Tolevi turned up the radio, afraid he was going to do the same.

  H-20 was the main road north, dividing farm fields and skirting urban areas much like a highway back in the States. Tolevi stayed on it until he was a little more than halfway to his destination. Fearing he might run into a checkpoint as he got closer to Donetsk, he got off near Buhas and began making his way west, using the GPS to guide him, since he had only a vague idea of where he was.

  Ordinarily, the back roads were a better bet against checkpoints and patrols. And according to the briefing he’d been given before leaving on the mission, there were almost no more rebel road stoppages in the area.

  So when he realized he was heading for one about ten minutes from the farmhouse where he was headed, Tolevi momentarily thought of running through it.

  Foolish, foolish.

  Unless they’ve already decided to kill us.

  “Up!” he told the others. “Wake up. Remember your cover story. We’re being stopped.”

  An old car had been pushed across the road, blocking off all traffic. There were two pickup trucks on the other side, parked parallel to the road just off the shoulder. A group of men huddled near an oil drum, smoking cigarettes. One of them stepped out, holding up his AK-47 to signal that Tolevi should stop.

  As if I have
another choice.

  Tolevi rolled down the window as he coasted to a stop. He put on his best cheery voice, even though he was tired as hell.

  Ukrainians, not Russians.

  Good.

  Maybe. They’ll be more apt to shoot.

  “Gentlemen, hello,” he said in Ukrainian. “How goes it?”

  “Where are you headed?”

  “I am taking the model and her photographer to Klaven Farm. I have to be there by dawn for their photo shoot.”

  The man who’d stopped them leaned over, peering in the back. Chelsea and Bozzone blinked at him.

  “Model?” asked the man. He reeked of cigarettes.

  “A photo shoot for some fancy French magazine. She is from Africa,” added Tolevi. “Somalia.”

  “Ah, exotic.”

  “Yes.”

  “Does she fuck?”

  “I don’t ask.”

  They looked disappointed, but not inclined to find out for themselves.

  “We have to search the car, comrade. Open the trunk and step out.”

  “I don’t mind you searching,” Tolevi said, “but I am late, and if you could hurry it along, it would be appreciated.”

  The man frowned. Tolevi reached for the trunk latch, then opened the car door. As he did, he palmed a ten-euro note from his pocket.

  “If I am late they take it from my pay,” he said, producing the bill. “Worse, they don’t use me again. Let me help you.”

  The man grabbed the money, then walked to the back. Two of his companions came over to gawk at Chelsea and Bozzone. There were at least two other irregulars at the side of the road, smoking cigarettes near a rusted oil drum.

  “They have papers?” the man asked Tolevi.

  “Yes. The company insists on working the right way.” Tolevi shrugged, as if he were talking about an affliction. “They’re always getting their permits and meeting with the big shots.”

  “They speak Ukrainian?”

  “They don’t speak much at all. I don’t know. African or something. Maybe English, if you try a bit.”