The Great Deception (7 page)

She didn't give anything away. "You don't
say...."

"Yeah. Frankly, I'm a little concerned about
the number of hostiles out there that would like nothing more than
chaos and tyranny." Keller agreed. "That's why we must work
together as a team. And that's partly why I'm here."

"I'm afraid I don't follow."

"It goes something like this--" her hands
hovered over her dinner plate like it was an open playbook. "--we
need to share information. I'd like to see more transparency from
your intelligence officials with the BfV. Do you think you can do
that?" "I thought we
were
doing that," Carlos
complained.

"Not according to these documents." She
held them up for everyone to see in a very confrontational manner.
"What's that?"

"Phone records from people in your own
counter-terrorism agency, the

Bureau of Internal Affairs, is it?"

"Yes, that's us. But what's that got to do
with lack of transparency?" "We traced the calls. Several
businesses that were on the list have affiliations with known
antigovernment parties."

Carlos blanched. How could this be
happening? "Why would my people be contacting those types?"

"I was hoping you could tell me," her eyes
narrowed.

"Are you saying I'm in cahoots with agents
from the BIA against my own government?" "We're checking into it,"
Keller said very firmly. "In the meantime, I've assigned a team to
work closely with your people over the next

month or so. Consider that your parole, if
you will."

The governor protested. Carlos shot glances
at his point man who looked equally shaken by the news. Keller was
good, too

good. "This isn't over," Carlos threatened
her.

"No, I'm afraid it isn't. We'll be in
touch." She got up from the table and excused herself. The rest of
her security detail went before her.

Well that couldn't have gone any
worse
, Carlos thought to himself.

--

Westover Ventures, LA

"Don't you think it would be wise to call
ahead to the forward deployed teams?" "Warn them, you mean?"

"You would want them to do the same for you
if that was your ass on the line."

"You have a point."

"I know I do! Now get on it!"

"I hope you're right on this," he muttered
as he prepared to ask his commander what to do.

The other security guard said nothing.
Instead, he walked a greater distance away from the guy who noisily
chattered with his superiors. If it were his call, he'd release a
swarm of drones to do reconnaissance since the scans of the
building didn't yield anything. He was almost certain they weren't
alone. But he needed something more concrete than a feeling. The
intelligence would have to come quick, too, before Scorpion got the
drop on unsuspecting Viper agents sent to do a job.

"Yes sir, roger that."

Those were the key words. He returned to
his partner, took off his helmet and straight up asked what the
news was. "They have agreed to send in our
Wasp aerial
drones."

"Those are the little insect ones,
right?"

"Yup."

"Nice work man."

"Just doing my job," guard number two said.
He looked at his vulnerable sidekick who still had his helmet off.
"Better get that back on. You're a soft target without it." "The
life support systems have been acting a little haywire," guard
number one explained. "Is the temperature in your suit
climbing?"

Number one laughed. "Yeah, you could say
that."

"Do I need to get a replacement, or do you
think you'll be okay?"

"I'm fine."

"Suit yourself."

The other guy didn't laugh at the
unintentional pun. "Are they gonna send the drones in through the
front door? What's the plan...?"

"The HVAC system, actually."

"Ah. Makes sense."

Number one sensed his questions were
beginning to burden number two so he decided silence to be the
antidote for that.

...

Nine agents got lost in the weapons division
of Westover Ventures. Well, not really. They meticulously turned
every rock over, looking for anything valuable to grab underneath.
Mostly what they came for were the encrypted schematics buried deep
on a hard drive somewhere for an important weapon the FRN
desperately needed.

The weapons division was a rather large
building. Over a hundred thousand square feet of dedicated space to
testing, prototyping, and offices. Several members of the team were
responsible for hacking into the computers and data mining its
contents. That would be a long and arduous process when time was of
the essence.

"I think I have something!" one man cried
out after ten minutes of searching.

Another searcher nearby stopped what he was
working on to take a look.

Looking at diagrams didn't help matters. If
anything, they further confused both men's efforts. Either they
were looking at a radical new weapon or a kitchen appliance for the
twenty-first century.

The agent who claimed he had struck a vein
of gold scrolled to the bottom of the document. He double clicked
on the small print to zoom in.

"The Oaster Toaster 3000?" he read aloud in
disbelief.

"Some weapon you got there, Miller," Tony
snorted.

Miller had the good sense to look
embarrassed. "There's gotta be some mistake."

"The only mistake here would be yours," Tony
was quick to point out. "Just wait till the boys hear this!"

"Hear what?" another guy joined the two.

Miller rolled his eyes.

Tony began to laugh. "Tell him!"

"We all have more important things to be
doing than making a mockery out of one man's honest mistake."

The lead agent who observed his team's
movements from a second floor lookout grew restless as the minutes
ticked by.
We shoulda been done by now,
he thought.
Apparently the outside world thought so too.

His earpiece began to go crazy: an incoming
transmission.

"Agent Jennings, this is the president here
with my chief of staff. What's the status of your mission?"

"My men are working very hard to recover
anything useful, Mr. President."

"So you don't have what you came for yet, is
that what I'm hearing?"

"Unfortunately, that's what we're looking at
sir."

A moment of silence. "Let me know when you
have anything."

"Of course Mr. President."

Their window was closing and Jennings knew
it. Pretty soon he'd be given the order to pack it up and report
back to the planes. The longer they stayed the more dangerous it
became.

--

Barcelona, Spain

By now Alfonso Marcello knew Sofia Keller's
meeting had ended. A parabolic microphone he had set up behind some
topiary in the dining room let him know that. The only way this all
worked? Keller's staffers overlooked the listening device planted
there to eavesdrop on a very important meeting. Why? In short,
money talks. They were paid off handsomely to keep quiet. What's
more, he overheard a state secretary of the Interior Ministry along
with a commissioner making plans to discuss a possible security
breach over coffee later that day. Pay dirt.

Alfonso's previously open afternoon now had
plans. No, he didn't plan on ending anybody's life today--not
unless it was required. However, an additional little intelligence
payoff would go nicely with what he already had from the
meeting.

Suddenly his own nutritional needs needed to
be met. But he didn't have time for a sit-in restaurant or
take-out. The agency had instant meals for a time such as this. It
would suffice.

He had a little bit of homework to do though
before he could follow up on the lead. For one, he didn't know
which cafe the politicians would go to. Only a minor detail. More
importantly though, he didn't know
which
state secretary and
commissioner he would tail: the German Interior Ministry had
several commissioners and state secretaries. Lucky for him he heard
the names Wendel and Amalia come up in conversation...enough to go
off of to do a search on the government website for their full
names. Agent Marcello didn't have a computer at his static post
where he listened to the event at Hotel Omm. However, his cell
phone was as good as a computer if not better. He put "German
Interior Ministry" into the search field and pressed enter for
results. The search engine returned the query with a dot gov
website he'd be visiting. A few screen taps later and Alfonso was
rewarded for his efforts. Now he had their names, but still lacked
the knowledge of where they were meeting. No problem. There were
websites for that.

Alfonso knew the SIM card in his cell phone
gave away his position by sharing his location. Whenever he wanted
to go dark, out came the card and off went his phone. But these
were government officials. Their phones were always on: that's what
he was counting on anyway.

Sometimes his job was just too easy. Agent
Marcello turned to the old cell again, logged on to a social
networking website called FindME, and voila...he had two red pins
on a map showing both of his targets' real time locations.

The pins weren't together either. No matter
though. All he had to do was follow one straight to the meet-up and
he was golden. At that moment hunger messaged him again: "Feed
me."

Alfonso had with him a brown fabric
messenger bag. His snacks were inside. What he had packed was
nothing to get excited over. Instant pizza with almost an
indefinite shelf life would be the highlight of the meal. Chemicals
loaded with cheese...mmm. A loaded chocolate chip cookie sounded
especially good--he would eat it first.

He sat on the cracked pavement in an
alleyway behind a dumpster. The cookie crumbled and chocolate chips
bounced off his lap as he bit in. Just then a door opened up
somewhere behind him. An employee from a local eatery tossed the
trash out with a clink. Alfonso resumed eating desert. Shortly
after he had the phone on again to see the status of where his
subjects were. They hadn't moved yet. The good news? The targets
weren't too far from him.

His eyes stayed glued to the screen.
Meanwhile one of his hands groped in the bag for something that
felt like pizza. One thing the agency got right were the chemicals
they included with the instant meal. When the meal pouch opened up,
exposed to the air, the oxygen reacted with the catalysts to start
a thermal reaction which heated the pizza up instantly.

The melted plastic with red paste and
seasoning, topped with pepperoni, agreed with the hungry agent more
today than it normally did. A motion on his screen made his muscles
tense. Someone was on the move. It happened to be the one closest
to him too. What luck.

The wiry man got to his feet quickly and
looked every which way. He looked like Captain Jack Sparrow from
Pirates of the Caribbean that day with braided dark hair, faded red
kerchief, patched rag clothing. What he needed more than a new
change of clothes though was a hot shower and some potent soap to
cut through the grease and the grime that coated him.

The undercover street bum emerged from the
alleyway and onto a major street that snaked through the bustling
city. It had been a while before he last checked in with the agency
to give them a report. He didn't need to though. His last
instructions were to come in after dark that day. That's what he
would do. A shower awaited him then...and a change of clean
clothes. Since Alfonso had ditched his transportation that he had
stolen earlier, he would have to walk it. That didn't present a
problem however. Unless the people he tailed decided to go mobile
and take a cab to their destination. Then he'd be screwed. His
chances of hailing a taxi much less getting them to escort him
places were slim to none. Being a street bum had its advantages and
disadvantages.

He picked up the pace and moved faster than
the flow of human traffic around him. Every once in a while Alfonso
looked over his shoulder. His cover was good, no one suspected a
homeless man of being a secret agent. There were enemies though
that wanted him dead. He had to watch his back. If he didn't
maintain an alertness, pay attention to details, read
people...Alfonso would expire early.

--

Mossad safe house, Moldova

Only one of the five helicopters landed in
Moldova. The remainder had orders to disperse their crews at
various locations in Europe.

It looked more like a farm than a safe
house. All by design. Thirty miles south of the Ukrainian border,
there was nothing but farmland and a river which happened to
irrigate the fields. Trees were few and far in between.
Consequently, so were people.

At almost two in the morning the men from
the chopper had an appetite something fierce. Seth didn't want
anything. The rest had to fend for themselves. There would be no
cooking around a fire. No need. The building had running water, a
stove--anything a man would ever need to fix supper.

"You sure you wouldn't want any of this
stew?" one man offered to Seth who sat on a rocking chair.

Judging by the grin on the guy's face, the
one holding the pot with an offensive odor emitting from it, the
contents most likely were spoiled.

Seth shook his head stubbornly. "Nah, you
eat it. You'll need the energy." The practical jokester with his
smoking pot of stew sauntered away disappointed without a word. It
was probably better for him that Seth didn't eat it, then he'd have
more problems to deal with than an overcooked meal.

With no one to confide in, Seth confided in
himself. The rocker creaked under the rhythmic back and forth sway
of the Mossad man. He didn't smoke, nor was he one to wander the
grounds aimlessly deep in thought. For the most part, he lived a
life with no regrets. Seth learned to deal with death as it
happened all around him. It struck his own wife thirteen years ago
shortly after the birth of his only child, Azriel.