Mark Midway Box Set: Mark One, Mark Two, Mark Three, and Mark Four

by John Hindmarsh

  His perplexity now wasn’t anything to do with his promotion or retirement.

  The last meeting with O’Hare and Cromarty had raised the hairs on the back of his neck. The NSA AD had gone way out on a limb, in Grovers’ assessment. Cromarty had been angry; at least he had appeared so, although subsequently he had taken no punitive action against O’Hare. Indeed, a week later he had authorized payment of a substantial amount to a numbered account with a bank in Curaçao. Grovers had traced details of that account and without surprise, had discovered it belonged to O’Hare. This contradiction in Cromarty’s behavior had triggered an alert reflex and Grover was now trying to assess his own position within the corporate organization.

  Grover suspected he was likely at risk, a sacrificial component, a pawn, in Cromarty’s plans. The man was Machiavellian. His planning was for far more than the next quarterly financial release by one of his companies. Grovers was convinced the man planned not only for the short term, but five or ten years out. He knew moves for his game when no one else realized the game even existed. That meant, Grovers decided, there were moves in place, which already placed him at risk. He needed to discover them. If he couldn’t do that, he needed to leave a trail to bring both men, O’Hare and Cromarty, into jeopardy—perhaps even open up a door for Schmidt to explore.

  The risks were substantial, if he had accurately assessed Cromarty’s personality. He’d been a part of the tycoon’s inner circle for two years, planning and plotting devious but always legal activities designed to further the man’s ambitions. Some months previously he had accidentally accessed computer files apparently maintained by his predecessor. At first, he’d thought Cromarty had engaged in activities that shaded criminal laws, perhaps sometimes—inadvertently—crossing over to the darker side. The details in the hidden computer files had persuaded him otherwise; Cromarty operated on the dark side. Grover had uncovered more than simply threads of proof; he had uncovered certainties.

  There was one trail—it led to the Middle East—which had fatal potential, fatal to him, that is, if Cromarty ever discovered he’d been digging into the files. There were links between Cromarty and Iran. He was aware Cromarty’s family had been refugees in 1975, a few years prior to the revolution that had unseated the Shah. However, he had never considered the man himself would have current links to Iran. Grover’s research indicated one of those links was possibly to VAJA, the Iranian Ministry of Intelligence. Shaken, he had stopped exploring and still shuddered whenever he thought how fatal his data surfing could be. He was conflicted, partly not believing the small threads of evidence and partly in fear for his life if his suspicions were correct.

  Absently Grover wondered whether O’Hare was aware of the full scope of Cromarty’s current Iranian links.

  He thought back, re-examining what had attracted him to accept the position with Cromarty. Obviously he had been tempted by the money. Cromarty paid him more than double what he had achieved in the Army. The additional income had helped—somewhat—to pay for the medical treatment and hospital expenses required by his wife. Perhaps Cromarty had known and traded on his need; he had no way of discovering if that was so. His wife had succumbed six months ago; her chemo treatments had failed to counter the fatal structure of the cancers that had attacked her body. He had no children, no close relatives, no one to share his cares and excitements. In some ways, he was a lonely man and to counter his loneliness he immersed himself in his work, exploring, always exploring.

  While he now avoided the folders with fatal potential, he still explored. Occasionally he would discover—or uncover—another vein of gold. His ability to override security credentials allowed him to read files on near and remote servers. Cromarty’s IT gurus had decided to move a large number of corporate files to the cloud—third party storage providers—and they had inadvertently included files from Cromarty’s offshore offices. These were files Cromarty would have regarded as top secret, containing extremely sensitive contents. The IT types, however, had failed to ensure network and cloud security matched internal strictures, and Grovers had probed and uncovered the weakness. He would, at a convenient point, let the network people—and Cromarty’s CIO—know of this failure. In the meantime he was enjoying hours of system surfing, which is how he had discovered the payment authorization to the Curaçao numbered account. Another file had provided the link between the account and O’Hare.

  More troubling at this point in his file surfing activities were the unexplained emails in his own business email account. They had appeared only recently, and although a sophisticated attempt had been made to bury them in innocuous folders, Grover had entered an unrelated search, which had accidentally revealed their existence. The contents appeared to be laying a foundation that was both false and likely to do him harm at some point in the future. He suspected they represented a component of Cromarty’s longer term game plan, and he, Grovers, was the sacrificial pawn.

  Additionally, he had discovered a small number of encrypted files in cloud folders, locations that he thought he had secured. He had thought he was the only person with access and authority to create new files. He had no encryption software, no decryption skills, and no idea of what the contents of these strange files might be. He had tried to delete them, without success. The resulting computer message was along the lines of: unable to delete file while it is open in another application. It wasn’t a problem he could expose to others in Cromarty’s offices.

  His self-defense antennae were quivering.

  It was time for him to build—not a counter, because his IT skills did not reach that far—but rather a revenge. Okay, Grovers thought, it might be that he’s getting more paranoid than either Cromarty or O’Hare. If his fears were never realized, nothing would happen. If, however, they were realized—exposure material would flow to people whom Cromarty regarded as his enemies. Grover began to construct his trapdoor process; he knew what files to copy and how to transfer them to his own personal cloud. Schmidt would sure as hell get the surprise of his life when it was triggered. As would Maeve Donnelly. And others.

  Chapter 15

  The troopers filed into the large conference room—it was really a media room with seating for twenty-five to thirty people—making comments that reflected their annoyance at the need to report in person.

  “I hope this is overtime,” one commented.

  “I’ve reached my sixteen hours; I’ll need to swap time.”

  “I’m missing my hot date.”

  “You’re always missing hot dates, we’ve heard.”

  “Hi, Allen,” one of the troopers said as he entered.

  Sergeant Allen Trevors was talking to Major Dunlap. The sergeant nodded to the man who had greeted him. Schmidt identified the newcomer as Lieutenant Joyce. Special Agent Dennis was standing close to the major, ensuring Dunlap had no opportunity to warn or contact any of the men streaming into the room.

  The troopers sat carelessly in the rows of seats near the podium. Schmidt took a head count, checking the presence of all concerned. He walked to the podium from the back of the room, watched with interest by some of the men. The remainder ignored his presence.

  “Well, Major, what are we here for?” The question came from Joyce.

  “Ask the man,” Dunlap indicated Schmidt.

  “What the shit’s the Army to do with us?” The questioner was anonymous—Schmidt couldn’t identify the speaker.

  Schmidt turned on the microphone and waited a moment. Ten members of the 145th filed into the room and stood at the back. They were armed. Their entry had not been noticed by any of the troopers except the major.

  “Gentlemen, this meeting is being recorded. I am General Schmidt. I’m assisting the FBI—we have five special agents in attendance and the agent in charge is Charles Thoroughgood. In the back of the room we have ten members of my MP Battalion; they’re here to observe. Unless, of course, there is a reason for them to act.”

  He paused while the troopers first looked at the rear o
f the room and then to their commanding officer.

  “What the hell is this, Dunlap?” asked Lieutenant Joyce. Angry murmurs underscored the general reaction.

  Schmidt said, “The major is not in charge here. I am. You can address questions to me; I may or may not answer you. Yesterday you each participated in a blockade on the Northern Expressway. We will interview each of you, separately, to discover why. I’d point out that a man was murdered and another was kidnapped as a result of your actions. And no, there will be no union representation here.”

  “Hell, there won’t,” shouted Trevors.

  “Ah, Sergeant Trevors. You played a key role in yesterday’s criminal activities. Play the Trevors tape.”

  Linda and her analysts had dialed in to the media control room adjacent to the conference room. They were ready, when they received an instruction from Schmidt, to play a number of audio and video files prepared from camera and audio recordings the team had gathered from Winter and police sources—the latter without permission, of course. Schmidt’s microphone was connected to a radio link back to Washington. One of her team members played the file they had labeled the Trevors tape.

  “Desk 301. Sergeant Trevors.”

  “Code 25. Winter Security, providing security for a client. I’m the client. We’re heading south on the Northern Expressway, approaching the 495 junction. One of our escorts has been taken out, we suspect by a concrete block dropped from the Chandler Road Bridge. Traffic is light. Our two vehicles are traveling at speeds of 90 to 100 mph. We’re in a dark blue Touareg—Volkswagen—and our second vehicle is a red Expedition. Can we have police assistance?”

  “Just one moment, sir.”

  There was a short pause.

  “Yes, sir. We can arrange vehicles to meet you.”

  “My driver advises there are two or three chase vehicles.”

  The caller provided vehicle details.

  The speaker who had identified himself as Sergeant Trevors replied. “We have troopers approximately eight miles in front of you. Three marked vehicles. They will wait for your arrival. Two will intercept the chase vehicles and the third trooper will escort you. Please do not disconnect this call.”

  Schmidt looked at Trevors and said, “I’m sure you recognize your own voice. The FBI will arrange technical validation to confirm our identification. The other voice was a passenger in a Volkswagen SUV. Now let’s have video tape 2.”

  The large wall monitor beside Schmidt clicked on, under remote control. Linda’s operator selected the video taken from within the Touareg as it stopped inches away from the front of a patrol car. Her team had added audio from the cell phone recording that she had earlier played to Schmidt. The operator played the composite audio and video file.

  “Are you in control?” The speaker’s voice identified him as Sergeant Trevors.

  “Not yet—the BMW guys are still hacking us.” The reply was from the caller.

  The video showed the nose of a dark blue SUV as it braked sharply and slewed across the road, heading towards the nearest police vehicle. It came to a stop only inches away from the police barricade.

  “Hell.”

  “We’ve got trouble. We have five patrol cars blocking the road, they’re all Highway Patrol. Troopers are standing next to their vehicles, with weapons pointing at us. The guys following us are very confident. Maybe there’s some collusion—let’s get out and see what this is all about.”

  Police officers had their weapons drawn and aimed at the occupants of the SUV.

  Two police vehicles left the barricade, heading down the highway.

  The trooper closest to the camera motioned with his handgun. He was clearly identifiable as Lieutenant Joyce.

  The trooper said, “Exit your vehicle. If you have a gun, leave it behind. As you exit, raise your hands.”

  “Come on, let’s see what this is about.”

  “I have a bad feeling.”

  “You’re not alone.”

  “That was an FBI operation,” shouted one of the troopers.

  “Shut up,” instructed Joyce.

  “I have another tape for you,” said Schmidt. “Video 3, please.”

  Video 3 contained scenes from more than one camera and included audio from the cell phone that Mark had dropped on the seat of the SUV. Linda’s team had done an excellent job of enhancement and recovery of the sound. The video commenced, continuing from the prior file.

  Both the vehicle driver and passenger exited the SUV.

  “Our weapons are in the vehicle,” the vehicle passenger said. “Why are you stopping us?”

  “Shaddup,” commanded the closest police officer.

  Another one said, “We’ve all seen the FBI BOLO alert.”

  “I’m with Winter Security,” the vehicle driver said. “We were under attack, as we reported to your base. Look—”

  The police officer who had instructed them to get out of the SUV struck the driver across the face with his weapon.

  He said, “I told ya—shaddup.”

  The driver staggered and moved as though to defend himself. A shot was fired and the man fell to the ground. The video showed the shooter at the moment of firing his weapon.

  The shooter said, “I think you can write that up as shot while assaulting an officer in an attempt to escape.”

  He leaned down to check the body. After a moment he said, “No pulse.”

  He stood and continued, “Thanks for your assistance. We’ve been after these people for some time. We’ll take the other one—you can have the body. Our boss will be in contact with your boss to express his thanks. We owe you, all of you.”

  The trooper replied, “You’re welcome. Glad to help the FBI. Did you lose anyone?”

  Schmidt looked around the conference room after the video stopped playing.

  “I think we all can recognize Lieutenant Joyce from those images,” said Schmidt.

  None of the troopers spoke; there was a hush as his audience attempted to assimilate details from the files they had watched.

  After a pause of thirty seconds or so, Schmidt said. “Well, there you have it. Criminal conspiracy, assault, murder, and kidnapping. You all were involved. At no stage did you check the so-called FBI agent. At no stage did you protest a clear homicide. You stood there, like fucking dummies, and allowed one man to be shot to death and another to be kidnapped. Personally, I think you’re all guilty and deserve whatever’s going to happen to you. Other charges are being prepared. The list is long, believe me.”

  Three or four of the troopers stirred, as though about to object.

  “Yes,” said Schmidt, acknowledging the possible protest. “Two vehicles drove off before these last events took place. I’ll leave criminal conspiracy on the table and remove murder and kidnap; but only for those troopers who departed. For the remainder—I’ll do everything I can to see justice done.”

  “Why is the Army involved in this?” shouted one of the troopers.

  “National security,” replied Schmidt. “The man who was kidnapped is a valuable person from the perspective of this country’s security. His kidnapping represents a potentially severe loss to the military, to the country.”

  “If it wasn’t FBI, who was it?” questioned another trooper.

  “That’s what we’re investigating. That’s what you should’ve asked yesterday.”

  “I want to talk to my union rep,” shouted the trooper sitting next to Joyce.

  “As of this morning, yesterday’s events were classified as acts of domestic terrorism by the DoJ. Now, all of you—including Major Dunlap—are suspended from duty. You’re all on administrative leave without pay as a precursor to dismissal and possible legal action. Any rights you think you might have, in terms of union representation, are suspended. You each will be interviewed this afternoon—I should say evening—separately, by FBI agents. They will determine charges based on the evidence, your cooperation, and your answers. Help yourselves—help us. Oh, you won’t be going home this e
vening, hot dates or otherwise. You’ll be held as either suspects or hostile witnesses. If you object and refuse to cooperate, I have a military helicopter ready to take you to our base and from there it will be a quick journey to Gitmo. Your choice.” He shrugged.

  One of the troopers jumped up from his chair. “Come on, this is all bullshit. They can’t do anything. We were helping the FBI—Joyce said so. Let’s get out of here.” He headed to the door.

  Schmidt signaled. Two of the MPs at the back of the room moved to intercept the protester and hustled him outside, crashing the trooper through the door. Dead silence followed, both inside and outside the conference room. Three minutes later the two MPs returned and resumed their positions against the back wall. Neither man was ruffled. Schmidt waited for another minute. No one spoke.

  Schmidt said, “Well, that’s one way to volunteer to be interviewed. Other interviews will commence now. Junior ranks first. Wait your turn. We’ll call you by name. Please refrain from any discussions. I can arrange for you to be held separately, if need be.”

  It was, thought Schmidt, going to be a long night. He didn’t think Joyce or Trevors had many friends, at least none friendly enough to stop disclosure of details that would seal the fates of those two officers. He knew—as undoubtedly did some of the troopers—he was walking on thin ice with his approach. He hoped the FBI would be able to cope with objections, if they arose. He was prepared, however, to carry out his threat, and move troopers to Camp Brewer and isolate them as suspected terrorists. He was confident he had communicated that certainty to his audience.

  They had better believe it.

  Chapter 16

  Was it the sixth time—perhaps it was the tenth time? He had lost count. Numbers now had no meaning. He twisted and turned as he sought to identify where he was. The room was, he knew, pitch black. He kept his eyes closed—there was nothing to see. He realized—this time someone had entered his prison. He knew if he opened his eyes the light would flood in and cause more pain. He kept them closed, as tight as he could. He did not want to open them, not yet. A voice, female, soft, low, pierced his eardrums.