A Murder of Crows (4 page)

None of The Moroccan’s followers had family in the country. There was no one to make public appeals for answers on the six o’clock news. They were the anonymous dead and Hicks knew the outbreak would soon be forgotten. The public didn’t like to be reminded of the fragility of their existence. The news cycle had since focused on covering celebrity deaths and pregnancies and political scandals. The world had moved on. The world had forgotten.

But Hicks didn’t have the luxury of forgetting. Neither did the University.

After raiding the house, Hicks had been able to track The Moroccan and his accomplice to a motel in Philadelphia. He brought both of them into custody following a bloody gun battle in the motel’s parking lot. Data he had been able to retrieve from The Moroccan’s cell phone and computer led Hicks to discover plans to infect people in D.C., Atlanta, and Miami.

Despite successfully hiding the attack as an outbreak of Legionnaires Disease, Hicks knew the scientist who The Moroccan had hired to engineer the virus had figured out their mistake. And if they were clever enough to create it, they were clever enough to perfect it. He had to stop it before that happened.

Which was why he had assigned Roger Cobb to get The Moroccan to tell him what it was. No one could lie to Roger. Not for long.

Roger liked to employ a variety of established and new methods—a delicate mix of sleep deprivation, water boarding, time confusion, mild electrocution and narcotic injection all designed to break the prisoner’s will and make him talk.

Another of Roger’s favorite tactics was time distortion. The Moroccan may have only been in custody for two weeks, but thanks to Roger’s tactics, the prisoner was convinced he had been jailed for over two years.

Roger’s methods had caused The Moroccan to yield some results about the scientists who had engineered the virus, but Hicks needed more. He had to know about the Moroccan’s superiors, his network, and where they were located. He needed to know the nature and timing and location of any other attacks they were planning to launch before they struck again. And Hicks never doubted they would strike again and soon. The University estimated the bio-weapon operation had cost millions to engineer. No one spent so much money to leave an objective unachieved.

On the previous day, Roger reported The Moroccan was finally close to breaking. He was ready for Hicks to enter the interrogation process and close the deal.

Such news would have been the highlight of his day if it hadn’t been for the surveillance of the CIA.

As the words and charts of Roger’s interrogation reports began to blur, Hicks flipped the tablet shut and tossed it on the table. A dull headache began to build behind his eyes as the enormity of it all began to settle on him.

As if stopping one bio-attack and trying to stop the next one wasn’t enough, now the CIA was hunting him. Hicks had been in the Game for over twenty years, but learning he was in the CIA’s crosshairs still gave him pause.

His mind drifted to why the CIA was suddenly interested in him. There had to be a reason, but why? The only other people outside the University who knew Hicks had The Morocan were Agent Tali Saddon and her handlers in the Mossad. The two agencies had worked closely over the years, with the Mossad often using the University’s information as a secondary source to their connections with intelligence agencies throughout the world.

From media reports and intelligence she had gathered on the dead men left behind in the shootout, Tali had deduced Hicks had been part of the shootout in Philadelphia. She had heard the dead men had been guarding someone important, someone Hicks must have taken with him. He confirmed it had been The Morocan, but Tali and her handlers in Tel Aviv had agreed to remain silent in exchange for daily interrogation reports on the prisoner. They also wanted The Moroccan transferred to them whenever Hicks was done with him.

He doubted Tali or the Mossad had turned him into the CIA. Tali had always been loyal to Hicks. Bringing the CIA into the mix only would have complicated her intention to bring The Moroccan into custody.

Still, the questions about the CIA rattled around in his mind.
Why me? Why now?

Hicks snapped out of it when he heard his handheld begin to buzz on the table. He was scheduled to interrogate The Moroccan in fifteen minutes. He planned on allowing the call to go to voicemail.

But when he saw who was calling, he took the call.

One didn’t allow a call from the Dean of the University go to voicemail.

“H
AVE YOU
told Roger about your run-in with the Barnyard today?” the Dean asked.

Hicks responded with the formality the Dean demanded. Details were to be conveyed clearly—without opinion or conjecture—in a concise manner. Speculation should only be offered if specifically requested. Orders were never to be questioned, though reasonable objections could be presented in a certain way at the proper time if they were followed by a viable, alternative suggestion. The Dean subscribed to the theory of complaint without solution was whining. He hated whining. “Not yet, sir. I’ve been reviewing Roger’s latest interrogation reports on The Moroccan in preparation for my interrogation of him in fifteen minutes.”

“Have it your way, but I advise you to inform him of what happened immediately after your session with The Moroccan. I have been able to uncover some information about why you were being watched this morning. I am afraid what happened to you this morning may involve Roger before long.”

Hicks was glad he was sitting down. Like the Operators, the Dean usually didn’t exaggerate, especially when it came to bad news. “That doesn’t sound promising, sir.”

“All of the hacked systems this morning were done from Langley servers,” the Dean explained, “but the surveillance was part of a greater effort. You are being hunted by the Defense Intelligence Agency, who is working in conjunction with the CIA and the NSA.”

Given what the Operator had told him about the hacks, Hicks had assumed the NSA and the CIA were working together, but the DIA was a new wrinkle. “What would the DIA want with me?”

“Not you, James. The Moroccan.”

Hicks closed his eyes.
Uh oh.
“I checked the watch lists myself, sir. The prisoner wasn’t being watched by any agency.”

“Not officially,” the Dean allowed, “but he seems to have been something of a pet project for the DIA for quite some time. They have had him under passive surveillance since his days aiding rebels in Kabul. They we unaware The Moroccan was even in the country until your Rambo imitation down in Philadelphia caught their attention. By tracing the associates of the dead men you left in your wake, they have determined The Moroccan is not only in this country, but is in the custody of some unknown entity. That entity is us, of course, but the DIA does not know that yet.”

Hicks grew still. He’d gone down to Philadelphia and grabbed The Moroccan on his own, without proper tactical coverage. It was still a sore point between him and the Dean. “How, sir?”

“You left a parking lot full of dead hostiles, James. Dead hostiles who were, in fact, on several watch lists throughout the world.”

“But it doesn’t explain how they found me, sir.”

“Because the DIA got hold of some security footage from the motel. Upon further analysis, they were able to identify both you and our prisoner.”

Hicks checked his temper as it spiked. The Dean hated outbursts as much as he hated informality. “Impossible, sir. Our Operators went back and scrubbed every image off any camera feed in the area. They even scanned any cell phone footage of the incident shot by civilians. There’s no way they tracked me that way.”

“Our Operators did their usual commendable job, but there was a camera we missed. It appears the hotel manager—one Mr. Edward Zimmerman—had installed a small security camera of his own in the motel stairwell. He told the authorities he had installed it in order to spot vandals trying to gain access to the motel via the parking lot door. He eventually confessed to installing it so he could film his illicit liaisons with various prostitutes who frequented the motel. The owners had installed a security camera in the office that was controlled remotely, so the night manager conducted his assignations in the obscurity of the stairwell.”

Hicks pounded the table and dropped his head in his hands. That’s how they found him. And now they knew what he looked like
.

The Dean continued. “For obvious reasons, the camera was not tied into the main computer system of the motel and, instead, went wirelessly into Mr. Zimmerman’s personal laptop. In their haste to cover your involvement, our Operators missed it.”

Hicks knew apologizing once again for his actions wouldn’t get him anywhere with the Dean, so he didn’t even try.

The Dean went on. “If we had been given the opportunity to plan the operation properly, we would have detected the presence of the camera and handled it. Alas, you were in too much of a hurry to ‘get your man.’ Someday, I may be able to enjoy the irony of one of my best Faculty Members being undone by the illicit hunger of a grubby little man in a hot sheet motel, but today is not that day, James.”

Hicks knew the Dean hated excuses, so he offered an explanation instead. “We didn’t have the time or the resources to plan a proper operation, sir. Grabbing The Morocan was worth the risk, so if nabbing him put me on the DIA’s radar screen, I can live with it.”

“I have no doubt
you
can live with it, but can the rest of us? Can the University?”

Hicks knew it was one of the Dean’s rhetorical questions. He wasn’t looking for an answer, and Hicks wouldn’t try to offer one.

“Your carelessness aside,” the Dean continued, “we do have a shred of good news. My source at the Barnyard told me the man spearheading the hunt for you is a DIA agent named Mark Stephens. Stephens is not his real name of course, but who uses their real names in this business? I will send you his file when we are done here. You will see he is a most capable man. In fact, many believe he is one of the best Beekeepers in the DIA. He used to run abduction and rendition operations against hostile enemy targets for the Air Force. Now, he has been assigned to a black bag outfit they are calling G-One for some reason.” The Dean laughed. “G-One. The bureaucrats love their codenames.”

But Hicks didn’t laugh. He had worked with Beekeepers before and knew they weren’t only interrogators. They didn’t grab high value targets off the street and beat confessions out of them. They carefully chose their targets and played them for the long haul—pumping them for information with methods specifically crafted for the target’s psychological profile. They nurtured a prisoner and got them as comfortable or as uncomfortable as it took to extract information from them, the same way a beekeeper gets honey.

Stephens wasn’t some cowboy hacking off
jihadi
limbs in the desert or beating some poor bastard with a phone book. Beekeeping was a tough, tedious job only a certain kind of person could do.

People like Roger Cobb and James Hicks.

Hicks chose his next question carefully. “Were you able to determine if Stephens knows anything about my identity, sir? Or of the University?”

“All they seem to have for the moment is your image, which they were able to trace back to New York City by using traffic cameras and other media. It took considerable effort, but as much as I despise them, I do not question their abilities or resources. They have confirmed your presence in New York. As they do not know who you are or who you work for, you should expect them to try to apprehend you. Their interest in you will only be heightened by our success in spiking their surveillance of you. For obvious reasons, we cannot allow them to succeed.”

“I know, sir.” He closed his eyes and steeled himself for the standard lecture he knew was coming.

“So I assume you also know The Barnyard and their ilk have been trying to get a toehold in our institution for years. Throughout our existence, we have managed to avoid a direct confrontation with them by posing as helpful amateurs who pass along information as we get it. They have taken us at our word because we have never stood in their way. Now, we have something they want. The Moroccan. Unfortunately, we cannot give him to them without tipping our hand and proving our existence.” Another long silence. “Do you appreciate the difficulty your rash actions have caused for both our current mission and the broader mission of the University, James?”

Hicks had been the target of the Dean’s anger several times in his career. There was only one way to respond to such a question. “What do you want me to do, sir?”

“The wolves may not be at the door yet, James, but we can certainly hear them baying in the forest. I will attempt to delay them as much as possible, but they have your scent now. This is why it is essential for you to break The Moroccan and break him quickly. Employ all methods at your disposal and hold nothing back.”

“I will, but I can’t go too far, sir. Our agreement with the Mossad in exchange for their silence…”

“Our agreement with our Israeli friends is secondary. Find out what the prisoner knows and report back to me immediately. The information he provides may be enough to stave off our enemies before Stephens and his ilk find you. Time has suddenly become a luxury we no longer have.”

The Dean killed the connection.