Deep State Stealth

by Vikki Kestell

  Urgent care

  Walking pneumonia

  Danforth was not entirely mollified. Johnson didn’t seem sick yesterday.

  He called downstairs to Safety and Security. “Johnson is out sick. Where’s the executive floor’s replacement guard?”

  “We have four officers out sick today, sir, counting Johnson. Some kind of chest virus, I’ve been told. We’ve called in off-duty SPOs to cover for them, but it may be an hour before we have an officer to send up to you.”

  Danforth’s heart dropped into his shoes. “Which four?”

  “Pardon?”

  “Which four officers are out sick?”

  As the supervisor listed them off, Danforth’s hopes sank further. The entire team from last evening.

  How likely was it that all four would be sick on the same day? All of them with a “chest virus”? Not even remotely likely. So, where were they? Had Johnson and his team walked into an FBI trap? Were they in federal custody? If so, what had gone wrong? And how?

  “Seems to be going around, sir. We have other employees out today. Some haven’t even called in. HR is having a fit.”

  That would be Colón and Tellerman, Danforth told himself, preoccupied with his own problems. But some vague sense of unease made him ask, “What others?”

  “Uh, well . . . hold one moment, sir. I’ll get the list. Here you go: Rob Tellerman. Sundhi Pragesh. Kiera Colón. Jayda Cruz. Mark Al—”

  “What? What did you say?”

  “Would you like me to start over, sir?”

  “Yes. No! Did you say Jayda Cruz?”

  “Yes, sir. The woman’s been no call/no show all week.”

  A wave of shock juddered up his spine. Jayda Cruz has been working here, right under my nose.

  Danforth hung up. Jayda Cruz working here? Infiltrating the NSA? Perhaps sneaking into this office? Invading my emails and listening in on my calls?

  He studied his trembling hands; however, he was not focused on their trembling but on what he imagined creeping in and out of his skin:

  Nanomites. Invisible to the naked eye.

  His imaginings worsened. His skin itched and crept; he scratched nervously. Are the nanomites on me? In me? Have they infested me? Are they, right now, crawling on me?

  And then, Could the nanomites have been in the shielded facility with us the entire time? Eavesdropping on our plans and secrets? Passing them on to Jayda Cruz and her husband?

  He looked again at his hands. No way to know. No way to be sure.

  His first instinct was to reach out to the woman, to warn her, to ask for help. He fumbled in his briefcase for yet another phone, one unused to date. Contacting the woman directly—particularly now—would be a risky, unprecedented move, an action reserved for only the most urgent of situations. As if this wasn’t?

  As his hand touched the phone’s cool surface, a measure of instinctual caution swept over him: self-preservation. If Johnson and the other SPOs were in federal custody, the greatest threat facing Danforth was the possibility that one of the officers would rat him out.

  The greatest threat facing him? No. He’d worked in the field with the woman decades ago, and his memories of the cold, merciless methods she’d used to “solve” problems were still fresh.

  In the broader scheme of things . . . I am a liability to her—and quite expendable.

  He slowly took his hand off the phone and sank into his chair. Maybe he hadn’t been the rock star intelligence operative the woman had been, but he’d been a decent agent, a good spy for his country.

  He called upon that training to help him now. If I am to survive this, I must save myself. But if what I suspect is true, nothing I plan or do will be hidden from the nanomites.

  He rewound every conversation regarding Jayda Cruz—no, Gemma Keyes—and her abilities and actions, particularly Cushing’s report on Colonel Greaves’ encounter with her. He remained deep in contemplation for half an hour, weighing his options, formulating his next steps. When he roused himself, he got to his feet and set to work.

  His hands now shaking, Danforth locked his office door. He placed his briefcase on his desk. Then he opened the safe where he kept classified documents and began pulling files—dossiers he’d painstakingly assembled as insurance against such a day as today. He scanned through them deciding which to take and which to leave.

  Leave.

  Danforth glanced around his office, considering the accoutrements of power he’d acquired through the years—the impressive furnishings; the wall of photos taken of him with presidents, senators, foreign ambassadors, and even foreign leaders; the plaques and awards.

  Leave? Yes. Better to leave all this than face the FBI . . . or worse.

  He called his driver. “I’m coming down. Five minutes.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He finished packing his briefcase and exited his office, locking his door behind him. “Cancel my appointments. An unavoidable meeting came up that will keep me out for the rest of the day.”

  “Yes, sir. I will. See you tomorrow.”

  No, he realized. You won’t.

  His home was in the country, north and east of D.C., and he lived alone. His wife had tired of him early in their marriage, and he had not bothered to marry again. Danforth had his driver drop him at his front door.

  “I have some business to attend to inside. I may be an hour or longer. Wait for me.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He went directly to his home study. In a corner, he touched a panel. It slid back, revealing a gun safe with a biometric lock. Danforth placed his thumb on the scanner and the lock disengaged.

  He inspected the safe’s contents and selected a semi-compact HK45 and three loaded 10-round magazines. He placed them on his desk and took off his suit jacket before he withdrew a second weapon from the safe—a Taser X26P. He sat down in his desk chair and considered his next move.

  Was everything Cushing told Harmon about the nanomites real? Or am I about to do something foolhardy and needless?

  He shook his head. He could not afford the risk. The next steps in his survival plan could not be monitored, reported, or traced.

  Danforth pushed his chair away from his desk and leaned back in the seat. Pointing the Taser at his chest and holding it as far from him as he could, he depressed the trigger. The darts exploded from the Taser and penetrated his shirt and his skin. The current sent excruciating pain through his body. His hand jerked and spasmed, and he was unable to release the Taser’s trigger, which kept a continuous flow of juice running through the leads to the darts. When the gun finally fell from his numb fingers to the floor, the current crackling through his body ended.

  Danforth sprawled in his chair, unable to move for two or three minutes. When the pain and numbness eased, he got up and, on quivering legs, picked up the Taser and placed it back in his safe.

  I have no means of knowing if that did the trick or if I’m being paranoid, he reasoned, but it was the only option available to me.

  Feeling calmer, he sat again, pulled the chair up to his desk, and removed the unused burner from his briefcase. Using his NSA-issued smartphone to retrieve the number he wanted, he dialed the burner.

  The voice that answered held a trace of accent and a large measure of wariness. “Yes?”

  “Peotyr, this is Lawrence Danforth. I am calling from an untraceable number.”

  Danforth said what he needed to say. He wished their conversation to be short and succinct and the arrangements equally so, but Peotyr was required to follow certain protocols before he could provide the assurances Danforth insisted upon.

  “I will call you back shortly, Lawrence.”

  “As they say, Peotyr, time is of the essence.”

  “I understand.”

  While he waited for the callback, Danforth withdrew a stack of twenty-dollar bills and a fake passport from his safe and added them to his briefcase. He then inserted a magazine into his .45, chambered a round, engaged the safety, and put the gun in
his suit jacket pocket. He slipped the two extra magazines into his other jacket pocket. With nothing else to do but wait for the return call, he went up to his bedroom and packed a small bag with clothing and toiletries.

  When he returned to his study, he pulled the .45 from his pocket and placed it on his desk. In case, he told himself. In case the arrangements do not work out.

  The call came twenty minutes later.

  “We concur that your recommendation will serve best.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.”

  The details were quickly hashed out.

  “I will see you soon, Lawrence.”

  “Yes.”

  Danforth stood and took a last look around. He picked up his bag and briefcase and left the house. His driver, as he’d instructed, was waiting by the front door. Danforth got into the car and his driver pulled away.

  “I’m going to give you very precise instructions, Shelby. You are to follow them to a ‘t.’”

  “Of course, sir.”

  Danforth issued his directives, confident that they would be carried out. Besides Shelby’s personal loyalty to him for more than a decade, the man had been a spook in his own right before being wounded. When he’d been deemed unfit for the field, the NSA had employed him as driver and bodyguard for high-level NSA executives such as Danforth. As odd as Danforth’s orders might seem, Shelby would go along with them because Danforth had led Shelby to believe that he was engaged in a covert meeting with political as well as national intelligence ramifications.

  Shelby would believe what he’d been told until the FBI presented him with proof to the contrary.

  It was after noon before they headed toward the beltway, using a less-congested side road. A few miles from their exit onto 495, the road entered a long tunnel that ran under multiple Amtrak lines. Shelby braked to a near stop; Danforth threw open the rear door and leapt from the car.

  Shelby, as ordered, accelerated, emerged from the tunnel, and continued into D.C. He parked in the Union Station parking garage a short hike from the Capitol Building. He turned off the engine, exited the vehicle, and locked the doors.

  As directed, he took the Metro home. Danforth would, Shelby had been told, return to Union Station when his business was concluded, retrieve his car, and drive himself home.

  Shelby was to take the following day off and await Danforth’s call for his next orders.

  IT HAD BEEN A LONG but satisfying night. Mal, Baltar, Deckard, McFly, and Dredd met us (plus Kiera and Rob) at the park at nine. Malware, Inc. came armed for bear and intent on justice. They shook Kiera and Rob’s hands, then Zander explained the double cross.

  “Four dirty NSA SPOs will arrive at ten with the remains of the President’s close friend. NSA DD Lawrence Danforth has ordered them to bury the remains somewhere in the park where they won’t be found.

  “Kiera and Rob, here, are FBI agents covertly planted at the NSA to investigate Overman’s disappearance. Danforth arranged to ‘lure’ Kiera and Rob to this location tonight. They aren’t supposed to arrive until eleven, at which point the SPOs have orders to ambush them. Of course, we’re all here early and will jump them instead.”

  Kiera nodded to Mal. “Thank you for helping us out. We didn’t know about the ambush until Jayda and Zander told us a couple of hours ago. That didn’t leave us enough time to get our bosses up to speed and have them sanction an FBI team to assist us.”

  At the mention of “Jayda and Zander,” the attention of the Malware crew swiveled our way for a collective “ah-ha!” moment. And just like that, our covers at Malware, Inc. were kaput.

  “We’re happy to assist the FBI without receiving the credit for it,” Mal answered. “This is personal for us. If what Ripley and John-Boy tell us is true, then it was Danforth who gave the orders to attack our headquarters twice in the last forty-eight hours. We lost a good friend—and we’re here to make sure Danforth pays.”

  Rob looked confused. “Ripley? John-Boy?”

  I grinned. “Another time, another place, another persona, Rob. Or is it Rob?”

  “Yeah, yeah. Point taken.”

  “Mal, you guys run the take-down while we observe,” Zander said. “We will assist only if needed.” He put an arm around me. “Ripley took a round yesterday morning. I don’t want her exerting herself.”

  The reaction was so sweet: Mal’s crew was immediately concerned and solicitous.

  “Should you even be here, Ripley?” Dredd asked.

  “Um, not to worry; I’m being seen to.”

  “I’ll make sure she stays well out of the action,” Zander added.

  Mal took charge then. He partnered his crew members with Kiera and Rob and positioned three teams to best advantage.

  “Kiera and Deckard, you’re with me on this side of the road. Baltar and Dredd, you cover the other side of the road. We’ll catch them in a pincer move; McFly and Rob, you’ll flank and cut off egress if they try to run.”

  The entire action took less than ten minutes. The dirty officers, led by Danforth’s lead SPO Johnson, showed up in plainclothes just before ten and drove as far into the park as they could, and we followed them in. As Johnson and his people got out and popped the trunk, Mal’s teams swept in from two sides while McFly and Rob closed off the road. Within moments, Dredd and Baltar had disarmed the four SPOs, forced them to lie prone on the road, and zip-tied their wrists.

  Then Kiera, Rob, and I examined the contents of the trunk.

  “Looks like you have what you need, guys. You’ve got them dead to rights.”

  Kiera shook her head. “Dead to rights? Yeah, I’m pretty sure we’d be the dead part right about now if you hadn’t warned us.”

  “We couldn’t have done this without the help of you and your friends,” Rob said.

  Kiera phoned it in. Then she and Rob shook our hands and thanked Mal and his team who were packing up to go. We “left,” too, but actually hung around (just in case) until the FBI showed up.

  Within fifteen minutes, the park was swarming with federal agents, including Kiera and Rob’s supervisor—who seemed more confused than pleased.

  “Tell me again how the two of you took down these four guys?”

  “Like we said, we had help,” Kiera repeated.

  “And, again, who? What help?”

  “Sir, as I said the first time, all I can reveal is that another undercover entity assisted us—an entity that prefers to remain anonymous.”

  “Another entity? What the *blank* does that mean? I need specifics.”

  Kiera pointed to the car the SPOs had arrived in. “I believe you’ll find all you need to solve Overman’s disappearance in their trunk, sir. What’s even more important, is that these officers can implicate the man who gave them their orders—NSA Deputy Director Lawrence Danforth.”

  Rob and Kiera’s supervisor almost choked. “Are you serious?”

  “As a root canal, sir.”

  “You’d better have your ducks in a row before you start throwing around these kinds of accusations, because if you’re wrong? You can kiss your careers goodbye—and I don’t intend to follow you out the door.”

  “You have these men solid for the murder of the President’s good friend, sir. Separate them before transport, interrogate them individually, and threaten them with the needle. They will crack like an egg, sir.”

  The phrase, “the President’s good friend,” must have finally penetrated the supervisor’s brain. “Holy *bleep*!”

  “Exactly, sir.” Kiera cut a glance toward Rob. “This is one of those once-in-a-lifetime, career-making cases.”

  Rob grinned.

  So did we.

  WE REPORTED THE NIGHT’S results to Gamble who, after grumbling his disapproval for a quarter of an hour, passed the news on to Kennedy.

  Before we went to bed, we had the nanomites send Danforth a text:

  Done

  No interference

  I guess we weren’t all that surprised when Gamble called the next morning. �
��The President has summoned you to the White House. Residence dining room, noon.”

  I about lost it when Zander cracked, “As in High Noon?”

  FBI Special Agent Gamble hung up on us.

  Sheesh. Can’t take a joke?

  Jayda Cruz, Danforth has texted Johnson: “Where are you?”

  “Nano, send the reply.”

  The nanomites, spoofing Johnson’s number, sent a text to Danforth’s burner phone.

  Urgent care

  Walking pneumonia

  “That should hold him for a few more hours. I just hope the FBI cracks one or more of the SPOs soon.”

  We’d already “called” in sick for the four SPOs, but sooner or later—probably sooner—Danforth would figure out that he’d been played.

  WE STEPPED OFF AT METRO Center around eleven and began our walk toward the White House.

  “You think he’s going to read us the riot act?” Zander asked.

  “The President or Agent Kennedy? Gamble already took a chunk out of our hides. I can’t see it getting much worse.”

  “Really? Cause you think the President yelling at us won’t be worse?”

  “We’ve completed one of our assigned objectives, Zander. We found his friend. That has to count for something.”

  “We’re giving him Danforth on a platter, too.”

  “Yup.”

  We hung out in Lafayette Park until it was closer to noon. Then we entered the White House and wandered up to the Residence. The President and Kennedy were in low, earnest conversation when we appeared, and the President noticed us.

  “Ah. You’re here. Thank you for coming.”

  I glanced from President Jackson to Kennedy. The President seemed calm but sad. Kennedy’s expression was nondescript.

  So far, so good.

  We sat around the family dining table, and Zander and I began to report our recent activities and findings, starting with the two attacks on Malware, Inc. We had just gotten to the part where Danforth and the mystery woman decided to abduct Abe, Emilio, and Zander’s sister and parents, when the nanomites broke in.

  Jayda Cruz, Zander Cruz.