by Brad Taylor
“So those guys can identify any MAC? Anywhere? Isn’t that a little like an illegal wiretap?”
He smiled, still pounding keys. “No. You have to have their software program installed in your device. In effect, you have to agree to the location service.”
“And you think this guy did that?”
He said, “No, he probably didn’t do that, but Skyhook doesn’t employ people like me. They won’t locate you without the software, but it doesn’t mean they can’t. Well, it doesn’t mean I can’t. All I have to do is get in their system.”
He continued typing and Jennifer came back into the room. She said, “Didn’t find anything else of value. What’s he doing?”
“Beats the hell out of me. Some type of black magic with a computer.”
He typed a little more, then said, “Yes! It’s here, in Colorado Springs.”
On the screen was a Google map, with a glowing icon. Creed went to street view on the computer, and I was looking at the front of a bar called Blondie’s.
Amazing. Scary, but amazing.
I called the Taskforce, seeing what they’d done with the data I’d given them. To my surprise, Kurt took the call instead of an analyst.
He said, “Pike, we’ve got him. The list you sent included a guy named Peter Scarborough. He works with Boeing as well. Both Peter and Booth are directly responsible for the monitoring of the GPS constellation. This morning Scarborough sent four thousand dollars via Western Union to Mexico City. I don’t know if they’re working together on this, but he’s a definite link. Address will be in your phone. Get moving. You have less than an hour.”
I said, “Sir, we have another location.” I told him about the MAC address, saying, “Getting Peter won’t be enough. We can always pick him up later, but we need Booth.”
“But you don’t know that’s Booth’s MAC address. It could be from someone who simply used his Wi-Fi, right?”
“Yeah, but this guy doesn’t appear to have a lot of friends over. If I go to Peter’s address and Booth’s not there, I won’t have time to redirect.”
“You have the same problem in reverse. You get to the MAC address and Booth isn’t on the keyboard, we’re screwed. Pike, we get one shot. The strike package will be starting their attack run soon.”
“You want to call it off? I don’t have the manpower for split operations. It’s either one target or the other.”
“You tell me. The president’s inclined to do so, but they’re all waiting on word from your operation. That includes the guys entering Syrian airspace.”
72
At forty-seven thousand feet, Captain Eddie “Bricktop” Brickmeyer checked the SATCOM radio, making sure the link was still established. Flying straight up the Mediterranean, he and his wingman were closing into range of Syrian air defenses, and he couldn’t afford to miss an abort, should it come. The last thing he wanted to do was attempt penetration of a hostile country flying into the teeth of an arsenal designed to destroy any combat aircraft that dared approach, only to find out his mission had been scrubbed after the fact.
He knew the importance of the operation, though, and took pride in the fact that his squadron had been selected. There had been a lot of discussion over the last few years about how the B-2 was a luxury the United States no longer needed. With the end of the Cold War and the beginnings of the War on Terror, everyone had started kissing all the special operations forces’ asses while looking askance at his missions, questioning his worth.
Why did we need such an expensive airframe? What terrorist group requires a Stealth bomber to eliminate it? When would we ever require such technology fighting a substate threat? That’s what the almighty SEALs and Special Forces were for. Better just to throw money at them.
Then this mission had appeared. No SEAL on earth could do what he was about to do. And no other aircraft could accomplish this mission. Could fly unseen through a barrage of radar and air defenses, penetrate and destroy a hardened, deeply buried target inside a hostile country.
When the president had asked for options to eliminate the threat of Syria’s chemical weapons stockpile, plenty of ideas had been thrown around, but there was only one left standing in the end: a B-2 carrying MOPs, or massive ordnance penetrators, one in each weapons bay.
The MOP was a GPS-guided bomb that contained more than five thousand pounds of explosives. The largest conventional munition in the world, it was designed to burrow deep into a hardened bunker before exploding, rendering that protection moot.
The pilots called it the MOAB: the Mother of All Bombs. It had never been used in active hostility before, and Bricktop was honored to be chosen as the flight lead for the historic mission.
He checked his instruments, talked to his wingman, and began his attack run. In twenty minutes, they’d be inside Syrian airspace. Thirty minutes after that, they’d be a ghost heading back to the Med, but the world would know they had been there by the smoking holes they left in the ground. Whether those craters would reflect the destruction of Syria’s WMD or the slaughter of innocents was not something that ever entered Bricktop’s mind.
Other than the release point, he had no responsibility for targeting. There really was no need. He knew how precise GPS was. Knew that the encrypted military signal would put the MOAB within three yards of where it was intended. As long as he released it correctly, it couldn’t miss, short of a catastrophic failure of the US GPS constellation.
And no way would that ever happen.
* * *
Abdul Hakim rolled over on his pallet and stared at the stars above his head. With the brutal heat of the Syrian desert, he, like most in his village, slept on the roof in the summertime. Dawn was still over an hour away, but he’d found it safer to make the water run before then. Before the soldiers awakened, skittish and willing to shoot at the slightest provocation.
He woke up his younger brother and they gathered the water containers — old milk jugs, gallon jars, and a battered plastic bucket — then descended the stairs to the street below.
Since the beginning of the uprising in Syria the brothers’ lives had become hard. Living in Palmyra, in the center of the country, the environment was a challenge, but now with the fighting, it had become downright hostile. Four months ago insurgents had set off a car bomb in front of the minister of intelligence’s headquarters building. They’d managed to kill seven of the dreaded security forces, but the explosion within the close confines of the cramped town had shattered the livelihoods of many more. Abdul hated the violence and dreaded the thought of real firepower coming to bear.
The village had once been known as a major tourist pathway. Built on an oasis in the middle of the Syrian desert, it had been a Roman center for trade. Called Tadmor by the locals, the sheltered town had erupted in 2011 with protests against President Assad. Unfortunately for the inhabitants, Palmyra had something else besides relics that the government desired to protect. Something worth much more to them than a few musty stone arches.
Protests here were treated differently than the initial outbursts elsewhere. Here they were crushed with ruthless efficiency. The soldiers patrolling the streets knew nobody was watching this desolate desert town, but their hostility was driven by more than the simple absence of press. After the first protest and the forceful regime response, the people realized that the soldiers feared more than just losing the town. They feared losing what they’d been charged with protecting.
Abdul knew none of this, of course. All he understood was that they no longer had running water, and if he wished his family to drink today, he needed to collect enough before the sun rose. Before the soldiers woke and began scanning for targets.
He had no idea that their paltry little weapons were nothing compared to what was on its final approach to his location. No idea that his entire world was held hostage by a radio signal weak enough to be broken by a clap of thunder.
73
The sicario debated whether to clean up the mess or just leave it as
is. He decided to leave it. Peter Scarborough hadn’t changed his story at all, and the sicario had wasted precious time making sure. He wiped his knife on Peter’s jacket, staring into the man’s lifeless eyes, the neck wound gaping open, like a second mouth under the one with the tongue lolling out.
He hadn’t died easy. After the sicario’s mistake in letting Booth escape with his lie, he had wanted to make sure with Peter. Leave no stone unturned. Peter had given him an answer at the mere threat of violence, but that hadn’t been good enough. The sicario had left the soles of his feet at the far end of the bathtub, strips of flesh looking remarkably like thick-cut bacon from the grocery store. Fatty lengths of meat that were now curled in a pile. It hadn’t been pleasant — for Peter anyway — but at least the sicario was sure.
According to him, Arthur Booth had called from a bar named Blondie’s about an hour ago, and he was probably still there. The longer the sicario waited, the greater the chance Booth would leave. He closed his knife and stood, studying a map of Colorado Springs.
Peter lived in a small brick rental house just off Platte Avenue on the east side of town, in an area that was probably the place to be in 1950 but now had seen time erode its façade. Most of the houses were small, and none had been built after 1970. Blondie’s was a mile or two to the west, in the small downtown area of Colorado Springs. A two-story bar in the renovated part of town only a couple of blocks from his hotel.
The sicario rubbed a smudge of blood from Peter’s finger off the map, left when he’d pointed out the location. He tossed a towel on the body and walked out of the bathroom.
Opening the front door, he stood for a moment, glancing up and down the street and seeing nothing but leaves blowing in the shade. It was so different from his life in Ciudad Juárez. Trees and sidewalks. Children playing. No graffiti. No trash. The American journalist had been right. Nobody in this world had any comprehension of men like him. No comprehension of how protected and insulated they were.
They still assumed that there was a cause and effect in life, never understanding the meaning of the fox in the henhouse. They truly thought that doing good would beget good, just because of the action — and in turn that doing evil would beget evil. It was completely alien to him, and he wondered yet again if he’d missed out on some greater truth.
He’d slit Peter’s throat from ear to ear, and even while he’d bled out the sicario had seen Peter didn’t believe it would happen. Didn’t understand how it could happen. This after his feet had been peeled like a grape.
The sicario had done the work, halfway studying his response, and was amazed. He’d killed many, many men in Mexico, and when the time came, they were always resigned, understanding that death was knocking on their door and accepting it. Peter had begged until the last moment, even after the torture applied against him. After he’d screamed out the answer for the hundredth time. Believing he could alter the outcome.
Strange.
The sicario walked out the front door to his rental car and drove away, not bothering to check around him like he would have in Juárez. There was no reason to look for the hunter here, because there were no hunters here. He was unique, like a predator that had been inadvertently packed in a crate and shipped across the ocean, arriving in a new land looking for food.
His confidence was a mistake. Had he spent half of a second looking, he would have seen another predator. One who was his equal.
* * *
I pulled into an alley behind Blondie’s, calling Knuckles on the radio. I’d left Creed at the apartment to find out what else he could about the hackers Booth had been in contact with, then had alerted the rest of my team, telling them to move to the bar and prepare for assault.
A block off of Tejon Street, the ribbon of pavement I was on led through a large pay-for-parking area behind the strip of bars running down the middle of downtown Colorado Springs. Full of college kids and business professionals out for a good time, the area posed a significant risk to surgical operations.
Knuckles came back. “We’re out front. No parking available except for a handicapped spot. I’m assuming the Taskforce will cover the ticket.”
I said, “Don’t worry about that. You got the computer?”
“Yeah. Hacking cell couldn’t do anything with it. Clock’s still ticking. What do you want to do?”
Which was the big question. The bar was a two-story affair full of people. Booth knew us all on sight and would probably run when we closed in, which would mean a nasty little fight in a public area. We might get bouncers on us, then have to take them out, causing someone to call 911, which would mean police flooding the place.
All I needed was about two minutes and Booth’s thumb. But the repercussions might be significant.
I said, “Stage out front. When I call, we enter from both sides. Decoy and I will come in from the back. Koko will lock down our exit. You come in from the front. Leave Blood locking down that exit. But don’t do anything until I get clearance. Calling Kurt now.”
He said, “Roger. This is going to be great fun. I hope the prisons here are better than in Thailand.”
I said, “Yeah, me too, since I won’t be available to break our asses out. Stand by.”
I dialed, getting Kurt immediately.
“Sir, we’re staged to go in, but it’s a bad, bad place for a takedown. I just want to make sure I’m covered for domestic operations.”
I heard a bunch of voices in the background and realized what was going on. I said, “Am I on speaker?”
“Yeah, Pike, you are. What’s the situation? We have about five minutes.”
I went into politically correct mode. “Sir, we are about to enter an establishment and locate the man using the identified computer. If he is the target, we will not get out clean.”
I’d made the call to go after the MAC address and ignore Peter Scarborough. It would be a defining moment in my life, either good or bad. If I was right, I would be a hero. If I was wrong, I would be the scapegoat of the year. Something I was used to, honestly. I’d learned early that it was easy to second-guess decisions but damn hard to make them.
I heard a crescendo of voices, then Kurt saying, “Hang on, damn it! Let him speak. Pike, we need to know the odds of success. We’re in the window for abort. We don’t make the call in the next five minutes, and we won’t have the ability to do so. Can you stop it?”
What the hell? What kind of question is that? I have no idea.
“Sir, I can’t predict that. I’m calling to ask for domestic authority. I’m about to enter a crowded establishment, and I’m going to do some damage. I don’t have time for surgical. It’ll be caveman. I’ll get it done, but I want to make sure that’s what you want. What the Oversight Council wants.”
Someone from the back said, “Yes, yes. Tell him to go.” That was followed by someone else saying, “Wait, he’s going to compromise the Taskforce and we don’t even know if it’s worth it. What the hell are the odds of success?”
I thought the place sounded like a junior high dance, with about as much intelligent conversation coming out. I said, “Colonel Hale, this is Pike. What is the call?”
The sounds evaporated, and his voice came on. “You’re off speaker. Pike, we have three minutes. I’m recommending abort. Don’t assault. We’ll live with the repercussions.”
I said, “Sir, three minutes means those pilots are already in the envelope. Already in danger. And the repercussions are much, much greater than some strike against Syria. We lose GPS, and the whole country falls into chaos.”
“Pike, that’s going to happen regardless. We don’t need to throw good money after bad. Compromising you will only cause the problem to be worse.”
I looked at Jennifer, thinking of what I was sacrificing if the call was a mistake. I decided Kurt was right. There was no way I was going to trash my life based on some wish that the guy was inside and could stop the clock. If I were wrong — which I probably was — I might be going to jail at the same tim
e our economy collapsed. Why throw gasoline on the fire?
Jennifer was staring intently at me, reading the hesitation in my voice. She said, “Pike, the Taskforce can burn. It’s just an organization. Do it. The guy is here. You have an instinct for this. I know it. I believe it. Don’t worry about us. Don’t worry about the repercussions of this operation. Worry about the repercussions to America. You can stop it, right here and right now. Do what’s right. Like in Mexico.”
I locked eyes with her for an instant. She nodded at me, and I committed, wondering if she had some ESP that I was lacking. Praying it was true.
I said, “Execute. Tell them to execute. I’ll stop the clock.”
Kurt said, “What? Pike, are you sure?”
I said, “Fucking execute. I’m out.”
I ended the call and said, “You’d better hope your instincts are better than mine, because my instincts are saying we’re going to separate prisons.”
She said, “Two minutes. Go.”
I left the car with Decoy, saying, “Lock down this exit.”
74
The Ghost watched Pelón’s car driving away and debated whether to enter the house. There was some reason he’d gone inside, and it might give him an edge. He’d been there for more than an hour, but the Ghost had no idea why. Maybe he should enter and find out what the man had done. At the end of the day, he had Pelón’s bed-down location and could always return to the parking garage, waiting for his chance again should he lose the man. But Pelón might not return to the garage, which meant he needed to stick to him and ignore the house.
Choices, choices.
Hours earlier, in Mexico City, he’d planned a route of escape, going to several banks and withdrawing as much cash as he could on the three credit cards he still maintained. He’d checked the balance and seen one of them was fresh, with over ten thousand dollars in credit. The others had about two thousand each, after the cash withdrawals.
