U
sman Akinbo felt the bus jerk over a curb and opened his eyes. They were pulling into a station somewhere south of Plovdiv, one of the many stops on the way to Istanbul. The cabin attendant rattled off a few sentences in either Bulgarian or Turkish—Akinbo couldn’t tell, but it didn’t matter either way—and the doors opened. He waited his turn, then exited, walking to the bathroom and ignoring the stares from the locals. He was used to it by now.
He paid a toll at the narrow stairwell leading down to the toilets, then tentatively stepped through the standing water until he reached a stall, the archaic, dripping restroom a stark contrast to the modernity of the bus he was on. After he’d finished, he climbed back up the stairs, bumping into more travelers attempting to pass by him in the tight corridor. They glared with a superior air, but they could in no way match the contempt he held for every one of them.
Born to a wealthy merchant family, he’d spent his first thirteen years in relative splendor, with private schools and personal servants. One of the few in Nigeria who could reap the benefits of the oil boom. When not traveling the world, he lived in a gated community in Lagos, on the beach of the Atlantic Ocean. A paradise that anyone of any nationality would revel within.
That changed in 2004. He’d accompanied his father on a trip to the north of the country, a little jaunt that should have been nothing more than a tour of a factory. For reasons he never fully understood, a throng had formed outside of his father’s motorcade, a hostile, smelly group of men chanting and waving sticks and other implements, their clothes barely better than rags.
The crowd had grown hostile, the veneer of human compassion ripped away by groupthink and replaced by the ugly hatred of mob rule. His father’s men had initially fired shots in the air to disperse the mass, then began firing into the people themselves. It did no good. In a frenzy, they attacked.
When it was over, his father’s men had been beaten to death. His father had not been afforded that mercy. Forgoing a quick end, he’d been dragged behind one of his luxury Land Rovers until he was no longer recognizable as human.
Reflecting on his life, Usman Akinbo knew that he had been truly born that day.
Taken from the crowd, he’d been handed to a spiritual leader in
Jama’a ahl al-sunnah li-da’wa wa al-jihad
, known in the local language as Boko Haram.
For ten years he’d been steeped in the evil nature of all things Western and the purity of the Islamic faith. He could no longer recall what his life had been like before or stomach the degradation of wealth and corruption he had been saved from. Now twenty-three, he relished the opportunity to be the sword of Allah. The first to travel outside of Nigeria for the greater jihad.
There was a reason Allah had him born in the Christian south to a corrupt stealer of wealth. Because of it, he had a passport and some experience traveling abroad. Not a great deal, but at least he’d actually been on an airplane before, unlike the majority of Boko Haram. He had also partaken in the forbidden and deceitful Western education long enough to have learned English, something that was a necessity to travel among the Western infidels.
His life had been hard, but it had all been for a reason, one that was coming home now.
He reentered the bus, taking his seat next to the window. In truth, he could have had any seat in this row, window or aisle. The vehicle was fairly full, but the person who’d purchased the seat to his right had decided he preferred riding somewhere else.
Akinbo should have been insulted, but he didn’t even notice the slight, happy for the extra privacy. He thought about making contact with his spiritual advisor. The pale Russian had been adamant that he did not, stating that the phone he’d been given would leave a trail of anything it touched, and he believed it. He’d heard the stories of how the Americans killed with their drones.
Even so, he needed to give his spiritual advisor an update, to let him know things were progressing as planned. The bus began to move, and he saw the passenger across the aisle put in his earphones and manipulate the screen embedded in the headrest to his front, while the man in the opposite window seat opened a laptop and began manipulating the keys.
Seeing the action reminded Akinbo that he had other options besides the cell phone. The bus was equipped with television, music, and a movie database, much like an international flight. More important, it also had Wi-Fi. Akinbo decided to send an e-mail. The Russian had said to use the address only for operational planning, but also that it was shielded from the Americans. And this
was
operational planning.
He worked for Allah, not some old white-haired, wrinkled Russian.
He booted up the computer, then accessed the Wi-Fi hot spot the bus provided. Getting on the webpage provided by the Russian, he typed in an e-mail address and sent a brief message.
I
thought I’d misheard the words coming out of Kurt Hale’s mouth, mainly because the encryption for the VPN made his voice sound like he’d been inhaling helium, but the white noise generator behind me wasn’t helping. Even though the room had come up clean for technical listening devices, we were taking no chances.
He saw my face through the laptop camera and said, “You heard right. Change of mission.”
“Sir, did you just ignore my entire report? Turbo was murdered. Someone is hunting us, and they’re tied in to Chiclet. On top of that they’re Russian. I know we haven’t proven Chiclet is preparing an operational act, but there’s enough here to continue. We need to locate him.”
After fighting the Russian grizzly bear, I’d called Brett and Decoy, pulling them off of the casino. I was torn with telling them to remain, but after the failed assault against the bear, I feared they’d be set up. I had no idea how many men we were up against, and clearly, they’d had surveillance on us while we were watching Chiclet. The fact that we hadn’t seen them told me they were either very good, or it was only these two operating. I couldn’t risk my men on the bet that it was just two people against us.
I’d decided to focus on Chiclet with our technical devices and back off aggressive surveillance for a day or two, repositioning to a different hotel.
The beacons we’d emplaced earlier still showed they were in Chiclet’s room, so I’d left Retro behind to monitor the microphone we’d emplaced. After eight hours of nothing, I’d had him conduct a B&E of the room, fearing we’d find it cleaned out with our beacons on the floor. Instead, everything he’d owned was still there, beacons still hidden—which meant they were doing us no good. I was fairly sure that he’d flown the coop, leaving his luggage behind, which was one more indication that he was doing something nefarious.
Kurt said, “I hear you, Pike, but I’ve got a change of mission from the Oversight Council. I’ll take your report back to them for resolution. In the meantime, get to Istanbul for the thumb drive.”
I started to lose my temper. “This is fucking ridiculous. You want me to take the team and go chase a thumb drive against some Israeli we have no information on whatsoever. Meanwhile, we’re going to let some seriously competent killers go free. Russians, no less.”
“Pike, Russians aren’t in our target deck. State systems aren’t our charter.”
The Taskforce had a very narrow operational profile that was predicated strictly on substate terrorist threats. If the target wasn’t on the State Department’s Foreign Terrorist Organization list, we weren’t allowed to touch it. Instead, it would be a CIA or DOD problem set. Which begged the question about this damn thumb drive.
I said, “And beating an Israeli to a thumb drive he bought from another Russian qualifies as charter worthy? This trumps a targeting of our own men? I didn’t realize we’d placed Israel on the FTO.”
Kurt scowled, knowing I’d just backed him into a corner and not liking it. I could see him about to explode, like I’d seen numerous times before. I’d just pushed some buttons the wrong way. Which was tough shit. What he really didn’t like was the fact that I was right about the whole damn discussion.
Even the encryption from the VPN feed couldn’t hide the quiver of anger in his voice. He said, “Do not question my commitment to my men. I cannot believe you would insinuate that I’m good with the death of Turbo and Radcliffe. You aren’t the only one in the fight, and we aren’t in the revenge business. We work to protect and defend a nation, not execute your personal vendettas.”
His words hit me slapped me, which is exactly what he wanted. My righteous indignation faded away like a snow cone dropped on a summer sidewalk. He paused a second, getting his blood pressure under control. Unlike me, he always managed to maintain a command presence, and wasn’t about to start screaming at my slur like he would have liked. I felt a little ashamed about what I’d said.
He continued. “I’m going to take your report back to the Council. It may not end up in a Taskforce Omega operation, but it will end up on someone’s target deck. As for the thumb drive, it’s got the ability to exponentially harm US intelligence operations much greater than the loss of Turbo or Radcliffe. It’s also exactly what you wanted when we created this adventure. The president is willing to bend the charter to accomplish the mission. He no longer trusts the established intelligence architecture. It leaks like a sieve. He’s chosen
us
for the mission. No more terrorism only.”
He was right about me wanting an expanded mission, but it would have been better if it wasn’t an either/or choice of finding Turbo’s killers. I said, “Okay, sir. I got you. I didn’t mean to poke you in the eye.”
He laughed and said, “Bullshit. Yes, you did.”
“Well, okay, I did, but you have to admit we’ve got nothing on the Israeli. You want us to hot-rod to Istanbul, and we have no thread. What am I supposed to do?”
He paused for a moment, and I knew the other shoe was about to drop. I could see it in his face. He said, “The profile is simple. CIA has some sort of feed into Mossad. They think they’ll get a location for the thumb drive through their assets, and at that point it becomes a race. I’ll send you what I got from the DNI. You’ll see it’s pretty bad. But it’s not a question of what
you
will do.”
“What’s that mean?”
“The Council isn’t comfortable with a civilian making decisions on behalf of the Taskforce, especially one that’s the CEO of a profitable business. Knuckles is taking over as the team leader.”
I took that in, understanding the motivations, but knowing their excuse was fabricated. What they were afraid of was someone in charge who didn’t give a shit about their hand-wringing. Someone they couldn’t affect with threats through the government system or control with their rewards and punishment.
Before I could say anything, he continued. “They think it’ll eventually be a conflict of interest. That you’ll make a decision based on your company instead of the mission.”
I said, “What do you think?”
“I think they have a point. Your decisions today had nothing to do with your company, but you sure as shit executed a potential Omega without any sanction. You hung the team out to dry because you could get away with it. And I mean you
and
Jennifer.”
He read the tea leaves accurately, and it hurt.
“So I’m cut out now? Is that where we’re going? You told me you wanted me to execute this mission because you wanted results. Now you’re telling me I’m too volatile. Not responsive to the chain of command.”
“You’ve always been volatile, but before I had some control. Now I’m not so sure. Mexico worked out okay, but it could have gone the other way. You made some calls down there that were tight. It gets people worried.”
The comment really aggravated me because I’d actually backed off on that mission, executing only after the Oversight Council had demanded it against my better judgment, but I knew he had a point. I’d gotten comfortable bucking the system because I’d always been proven right, but today, we’d failed, and I couldn’t predict the repercussions of that failure. Maybe I’d become a little too cozy thumbing my nose at the Oversight Council while using their very assets to execute missions. Assets that were entrusted to my judgment.
I said, “Why’d you say you wanted me in charge for this? I mean, if you didn’t trust me.”
He said, “I
do
trust you. Don’t turn this into a witch-hunt. Look, let this go for a little bit. Let Knuckles take the helm. We need to work out how your company fits in. I want it to exceed other cover companies, but it’s new terrain. We need to figure out how the chain of command will work. It’s a different world, especially with an expanded mission set. You wanted it, and I want you in it. Get that little thumb drive and we’ll go from there.”
I heard the door open behind me and saw a shadow in the reflection of the glass. I heard Knuckles say, “Still no movement in the room. You want to pull Retro, or keep him in place?”
I suppose I should have been pissed at seeing him, wanting to keep my little fiefdom and protect my interests, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I had no issue with giving him command. He was about as good an operator as existed, and I’d follow him under fire easily. Combat wasn’t the issue. The decisions outside of combat, the ones necessary to
prevent
combat, were what worried me. I might be scary to the Oversight Council, but the very thing in me that caused their fear had also prevented several travesties. Risk early had prevented death later.
Not my worry now.
I said, “Bring him home, but before you do that, take a seat.”
I turned back to the screen. “Sir, I have Knuckles here. Still nothing from the hotel. He’s gone. Before we get into the meat, has anything come from Chiclet’s connections?”
Knuckles took a chair and said, “What’s up?”
On the screen I saw Kurt grimace, not wanting to talk to Knuckles in my presence. A painful thing that I wasn’t going to make more comfortable. He said, “Are we done?”
I said, “Yeah. I got it. I’m good. Just give me anything on Chiclet. I won’t chase him without your blessing.”
Kurt said, “We have nothing. There’s one contact to a Boko Haram spiritual leader via e-mail, but we have no idea if it’s him.”
I perked up. E-mail was always a good thing, both in content and geolocation. “Why? What did the e-mail say? You should be able to figure out his fingerprints fairly easily.”
“All we have is metadata. The e-mail came from a protected source, and we’re not getting content.”
I was getting very sick of the Snowden snowball. We had a lot of capability inside the Taskforce, but it was all tactically focused on geolocation for specific counterterrorist applications. We didn’t have the capability to gather any content from the massive amount of various digital and analog communications around the world. That’s what the NSA was for, and there was no reason to duplicate them—and no way would we even want to, until Snowden had caused the NSA to become skittish on just about everything.
“What the hell does that mean? Boko Haram barely uses electricity, and they’ve sent a disciple out into the world. If he got an e-mail, it’s from Chiclet.”
On the screen, knowing he’d already given me enough lumps to the head, Kurt held up his hands and said, “Pike, I don’t know why it was firewalled. Something about the nature of the e-mail. We’ve got an inquiry in through our systems to readdress, but right now, it’s metadata only.”
Meaning the e-mail header. But that would be good enough. It would have the ISP the e-mail went through, and with that, I could get a general location of where he had gone.
“Can you pass that to the hacking cell? Let them dig a little?”
He nodded. “Yeah. I can do that. But no execution on anything without me talking to you. You understand?”
I said, “Yeah. I got it. I’m not in charge anyway. I’ll go through Knuckles.”
Knuckles looked at me in confusion, saying, “What’s that mean?”