Tom Clancy Under Fire

by Grant Blackwood

  “You said ‘claimed.’”

  “They had nothing,” Seth replied. “Nothing except a mistake my dad made when he joined. He lied about his heritage.”

  Jack felt a sinking feeling in his belly. “He was Armenian.”

  “Yeah, he emigrated here in ’fifty-three. He had a false passport and birth certificate. His real name was Boghos—Armenian for ‘Paul’—Grigorian.”

  “Christ,” Spellman muttered.

  “They thought he was a KGB plant. He wasn’t. He was loyal.”

  “Then why the false documentation?” asked Jack.

  “He knew they wouldn’t take him. He wanted to join the military, but they rejected him for asthma, so he applied to CIA. He just wanted to serve, Jack, and he did. Then they tossed him out.”

  Jack wondered if Seth recognized the striking parallels between his father and himself: Both had tried to join the military and then, failing that, had joined CIA.

  “Langley should have caught this,” Spellman said.

  “Which is why they didn’t prosecute; they didn’t want the embarrassment. But what they did was just as bad. They called him a traitor, stripped him of his retirement, his right to vote, kept him under surveillance for the next ten years . . .” Seth’s voice broke; he wiped at his eyes. “They hounded him to death.”

  “I’m sorry, Seth,” said Jack.

  “Yeah, me too.”

  Spellman asked, “How the hell did you get hired with your history?”

  “Either I slipped through the cracks like my dad or they decided to give me a chance. What happened with him was half a century ago.”

  Jack asked, “Did you join with all this in mind, to redeem your dad?”

  “I only found out about him a few years ago. My mom told me after he died; in fact, I think my joining CIA pushed him to tell her the story.”

  “How did your dad’s manual end up in the Soviets’ hands?”

  “I don’t know, but it wasn’t him. And as far as I know, they never made use of it. You gotta believe me.”

  Jack wasn’t sure one way or the other, and it was irrelevant now. “Where did you get it?”

  “Doesn’t matter.”

  “Bullshit,” said Spellman. “What’s the big deal with this damned thing?”

  “I’m using it as the blueprint for Dagestan.”

  “You’re what?” Spellman roared. “That’s ridiculous, Seth. That thing is, what, fifty years old?”

  “Fifty-two.”

  “It’s obsolete! And it was written for Armenia. Not Dagestan!”

  “That doesn’t matter, I’m proving that here.”

  “And in the process, what, absolve Daddy, soothe your boo-boos? This is abso-fucking-lutely unbelievable!” Spellman stalked away, kicked a pail across the hut. “God damn it, Seth! Do you really think CIA stopped planning coups after your dad got the boot? You’ve lost it, man. Gone.”

  Spellman was at least partially right. For Seth to think a coup manual from the early days of the Cold War was viable for today’s world meant he was at best unstable; at worst, he’d lost touch with reality. Did he even care about this coup succeeding for its own sake, or was this just a personal mission?

  Seth asked, “By the way, Jack, where is it?”

  “In a safe place.”

  Spellman walked back to the table. “It’s done. We’re outta here.”

  “Fuck that,” Seth shot back. “You go. I’m staying.”

  Spellman reached into his jacket and came out with a Glock 19. He let it dangle beside his leg. “You want to stay? Fine by me. I’ll bury you in this goddamned shed. You’re fucking with my career, man.”

  Jack knew the CIA man meant it. He rose from his stool. “Okay, everybody relax. Matt, put it away.”

  Spellman turned his gaze to Jack. “Huh-uh. Who are you, anyway? Some financial nerd? Not buying it. You’ve got some training. You show up, chase all over Tehran—”

  “Leave him alone, Matt.”

  “Shut up.”

  Jack said, “Matt, you’re right. I’ve got some training, but believe me, we’re on the same side. If you shoot Seth, you’ll have to kill me and Ysabel, too. Are you prepared to do that?”

  Spellman grumbled a curse under his breath, then returned the Glock to its holster. “Just tell me: Who are you exactly, aside from the First Son?”

  Jack gave him what he hoped was a disarming smile. “Ask me no questions . . . Let’s work this through. Seth, convince us why Matt shouldn’t abort this whole thing.”

  “Because the plan is working. Come on, Matt, you know the pieces we’ve got in place, you know how long we’ve been grooming Medzhid. Listen, my dad’s plan ain’t the standard ‘Take the radio station and arrest the president’ bullshit. He was ahead of his time.

  “Think about it,” Seth went on, ticking points on his fingers:

  “Medzhid’s got a ninety-plus approval rating; the people love him, Avars and minorities alike, Muslims and Orthodox alike. He’s become Dagestan’s de facto foreign minister; he’s made inroads with Tbilisi, Baku, and even fuckin’ Grozny. They’ll all step up when the time comes. He’s got all but a handful of district police commanders on his side, and those he doesn’t have are outliers.

  “Jack, we know they’re going to shut down cell towers and regular Internet as soon as things get started, so we’ve got the whole of Makhachkala rigged with access hubs that’ll be manned and guarded for the duration.”

  “Hubs?”

  “See, we’re not so worried that people won’t be able to call out of the country. We want to make sure the visuals get out, and since Crimea, Ukraine, and Estonia, Volodin has ordered satellite Internet dishes from the bigger republics confiscated. Medzhid’s had no choice but to comply. Our hubs are basically collection centers for uploading videos and pictures. We’ve got a network of blind agents, and they are their own network, and so on, like a pyramid scheme. After a half-dozen handoffs and cutouts, videos and pictures that get taken on the streets end up at a hub, which then uploads them via satellite Internet. We figure if we can get even twenty percent of the on-the-ground stuff uploaded it’ll go viral on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, all that. The more live stuff we’ve got, the less chance of Moscow putting its own spin on things.”

  “This is where you’ve lost me, Seth. You said you’ve based your plan on your dad’s manual. Back then, there was no—”

  “Semantics, Jack. I’m using the manual as a rough blueprint. He talked about controlling communications, making sure none of it was happening in a vacuum, that kind of stuff. I’m just applying that principle to our technology.”

  “Got it. Keep going.”

  “As for crowd control, we’ve got both online and on-the-ground organizers and a precise timetable with primary and secondary rally points. Two hours after we pull the trigger there’ll be a hundred thousand people on the streets, ten thousand cell phones filming it, and hundreds of international outlets airing every one of them. It’ll make the Arab Spring look like a . . . like an old ladies’ bingo meeting.

  “See, Jack, that’s what people don’t understand: Coups aren’t about infrastructure or who’s taken over which building. Coups are about people, exposing their shit lives and telling them it doesn’t have to be that. It’s about hope—and someone they focus that on. That’s why we’ve spent so much time on Medzhid, his image, his message. We’re framing the debate so when everything jumps off, the opposition will never catch up.”

  Jack had to admit that whatever Seth’s failings elsewhere, both personal and professional, he was passionate. He was, Jack decided, a true believer.

  “While all this is going on, what’re the Russian troops in Dagestan doing?”

  Seth grinned. “You should really keep up on your reading. Since Ukraine and Estonia, Volodin’s downsized the garrison here—sixty tho
usand to sixteen thousand, and three-quarters of those are stationed in districts along the Chechen border. The ones left in the capital are native Dagestanis. We’re guessing they won’t turn their guns against their own people.”

  “You better be right. If not—”

  “We’re right. See, Jack, Volodin’s got a big PR problem and don’t let anybody tell you he doesn’t care. So far, anytime a republic’s even hinted at wanting to break away, his solution has been to send in troops and tanks. The question is being asked in Moscow: If Volodin can’t keep the Federation together without using force, maybe he’s not the right man for the job. He needs this coup to fail organically.”

  “What about Dagestan’s president?”

  “Nabiyev? He’s dirtier than Papa Doc Duvalier and he dances every time Volodin jerks his strings. The people are sick of it. He’s covered his tracks pretty well, but once we’re done with him, his corruption will be out for everyone to see. He’ll have ten thousand pissed-off protesters on the doorstep of his mansion.”

  “Well, none of this might matter,” Spellman replied. “You said it yourself: Wellesley and Pechkin are ahead of us.”

  “Not that far,” Seth replied. “They’ve got bits and pieces, but not enough to stop it, and they don’t know the timetable. What’s Volodin going to do, roll the tanks south, park them on the border, and wait? Guys, what the hell does it matter if I’ve got another dog in the hunt? The point is, we can win it.”

  Jack had to admit Seth’s case was compelling.

  Spellman said, “You should have told me.”

  “Don’t pull the plug. Please. Let’s finish it.”

  Spellman glanced at Jack. “What do you think?”

  “Me? Listen, I reunited the two of you. My part in this is over.”

  “You don’t mean that,” Seth replied.

  “You’ve got hundreds of thousands of Dagestanis on your side. You don’t need me. But if it makes you feel any better, I’ll watch it all on TV and raise a beer when Medzhid’s on the throne.”

  “Actually, we do need you, Jack,” said Seth. “If we don’t get Medzhid’s daughter back and prove we weren’t behind it, the whole thing’s over before it starts.”

  “What do you care more about, the coup or making sure this girl doesn’t get a bullet in the back of her skull?”

  “Come on, Jack. Of course I don’t want her to die.”

  “Then send someone else. You have to have special-ops guys around here someplace. They know how to do kidnap-and-rescue.”

  “There is no one else,” said Spellman. “And Seth and I can’t leave, not this late.”

  “Then call Langley and have them put somebody on a goddamned Gulfstream.”

  “If I call home they’re going to ask me questions I don’t want to answer—and I don’t want to lie about. Better to ask for forgiveness than for permission.”

  Seth said, “It has to be you.”

  Jack sat back down on the stool. Bad idea, Jack.

  “Where’s she go to school?” he asked.

  Dundee, Scotland

  JACK PULLED to the side of the road and turned on his hazard lights, then checked his phone’s screen. Outside, the wind buffeted his Ford Fiesta hatchback. He glanced up, half expecting to see the Fiesta sliding sideways on the road, but saw only the serrated waves crashing against the seawall out his side window. The Firth of Tay, which Jack assumed was Gaelic for “stretch of nasty water,” had been raging since he arrived the previous day. On the upside, the sun was out and bright. Jack adjusted the roof visor so he could better see the phone’s screen.

  “Shit,” he muttered. He’d taken a wrong turn three miles back. The signs for Dundee were few and far between, and his phone reception was spotty.

  The day before, after following Seth and Spellman east to the Azerbaijani coast to Lankaran, Jack and Ysabel had checked into a motel off the M3 and gotten a few hours of sleep. The next morning, on the way to the Baku airport with a mildly disgruntled Ysabel (Jack had asked that she remain behind to keep an eye on Seth), he’d called home and gotten Gerry, John Clark, and Gavin Biery on the line and prepared himself for yet another uncomfortable discussion.

  He laid out what had happened in the last twelve hours, from the ambush at the farmhouse to Seth’s revelation about his father’s secret past, Oleg Pechkin, and the CIA’s plans for the Dagestan coup. Jack ended the story with a paraphrased version of the case Seth had made for not abandoning the coup.

  “Well, I’ll give him this, it’s a solid plan,” Gerry said. “Still, your friend sounds nuts. Sorry, but it has to be said.”

  “‘Nuts’ is a stretch, Gerry,” said Clark. “He’s got some daddy issues, so what? When I was at Langley I met a shit-ton of people that should’ve been wearing canvas ‘Hug me’ jackets.”

  “You’re mellowing with old age.”

  “The point is, it could work. And I think the Brits are wrong. Getting Dagestan out of Volodin’s sphere is the smart move. It’s worth the risk.”

  “My concern isn’t whether it’s worth the risk. The plan looks good in the abstract, but what about in execution? On paper the Bay of Pigs should have worked. Jack, how long do you have to get this girl back to Medzhid?”

  “Just under a week.”

  “Not much time. You’ll have to move faster than the police—probably Scotland Yard, given who her father is.”

  “Also, Medzhid wants proof that Seth and Spellman didn’t order the kidnapping.”

  “You didn’t tell us that.”

  “It slipped my mind.”

  John Clark said, “If the police get to her first, you can forget about the proof Medzhid wants.”

  “Okay,” Gerry said, “how do you want to go about this—finding one girl in a city of half a million?”

  “I need Gavin.”

  “Shoot, Jack.”

  “First, find out if the story has broken about the girl. Her name is Aminat. Medzhid hasn’t alerted the authorities himself, but I doubt her disappearance has gone unnoticed. Next, get on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, whatever, and see what her friends are talking about. Finally, see if you can hack into the university’s campus security. Look for any reports that jump out at you.”

  “Like what?”

  “Stalking, break-ins, thefts—especially if they came from Aminat herself or they happened near where she lives or hangs out.”

  • • •

  TWO HOURS LATER Gavin called with bad news, or mostly so. If the Edinburgh police knew about Aminat’s kidnapping, they were keeping it quiet, which dovetailed with the kidnappers’ instructions. This was the good news. The bad news was that if in fact there was an investigation Jack could tap into, the information might be buried deep behind firewalls. If so, Jack was counting on Gavin’s open-source data-mining skills being faster than those of the police.

  As for Edinburgh University’s campus police database, Gavin told him, they had no reports that fit Jack’s criteria.

  “There is one thing that caught my eye, though. The day before Aminat went missing, a girl named Amy Brecon went missing for about twenty-four hours. After an anonymous call, the police found her tied up in a garage off Kirkgate Road.”

  “Get me everything you can on the garage.”

  “Right. Apparently, the girl’s jaw was broken and she’d been drugged. Now, get this: According to Twitter, Aminat went by the nickname Amy.”

  “Go on.”

  “Both Amys lived at Pollock Halls, and they look a lot alike. I’ve seen their Facebook profile pages myself.”

  “Where can I find her?”

  “They transferred her this morning from Saint John’s Hospital to Ninewells in Dundee.”

  • • •

  JACK PULLED into Dundee at seven o’clock and followed the signs to Ninewells, which sat a few miles from the coast north of
the airport. The hospital complex was sprawling, with white buildings sitting on 150 acres of lush green lawns. He parked in the main lot, walked into the lobby, and used the lighted information map to find the correct ward. Level 5, ward 17.

  A woman in the nearby information booth asked, “May I help you, sir?”

  “What are your visiting hours?”

  “Eight in the morning until eight at night. You’ve got a bit of time yet.”

  “Thanks.”

  Jack found the elevator banks and took a car up to level 5, followed the signs to ward 17, then walked down the hall to Amy Brecon’s room. As he passed the door, he saw a middle-aged man and woman sitting beside the girl’s bed, chatting quietly.

  Jack turned around and walked back to the visitors’ lounge beside the elevators. He sat down, started paging through a magazine, and waited.

  At seven forty-five, Amy’s visitors—her mom and dad, Jack assumed—came around the corner and pressed the elevator call button. Once the car’s doors closed, Jack returned to Amy’s room. The interior was dimly lit and the curtain around Amy’s bed was half drawn. Jack gently rapped on the door.

  “Hello?” Amy called groggily.

  Jack stepped forward through the curtain. The side of the girl’s face was yellow and black and still badly swollen.

  “Hi, Amy, my name is Jack. I was wondering if I could talk to you for a couple minutes.”

  “Are you the police?” she asked, through the wires securing her fractured jaw. “I already talked to—”

  “Just a few follow-up questions, if that’s okay.”

  “Okay.”

  Jack pulled up a chair.

  Amy said, “You’re American.”

  Jack smiled. “A transplant from Los Angeles. I’ve got family here, so I decided to get away from the smog. I heard what happened to you. I’m sorry. I know you’ve been through all this with the other inspectors, but I’d like to go over it once more. What do you remember about that night?”