The Chimera Secret

by Dean Crawford

  She checked her mirror as she rounded the switchback and joined the US-1 headed straight back toward the Potomac. The GMC didn’t show. Natalie joined the flow of traffic and wondered briefly if the whole thing had been just a waste of time and gasoline. By the time she made it back to the district again and got parked she would barely have time to grab something for lunch before she would be due back at her desk.

  ‘Dammit.’

  She thumped the wheel and turned on her signal to change lane as she glanced in her mirror.

  Her heart skipped a beat.

  The dark-blue sedan was two cars back. She blinked, checked again. Same vehicle, same plate. Only the driver was alone now, his passenger gone. Natalie’s mind went into overdrive. The sedan had pulled off somewhere between the Esplanade and the switchback south for the Jefferson Davis Highway. It could have been someone dropping a work colleague home, or a friend to the metro, or just a family member who got out for a walk in the sunshine over the bridge. Anything. And now they were headed back to the district.

  Natalie saw a truck cruising slowly in the inside lane ahead. On an impulse, she switched lanes and dropped in behind it as she grabbed her cellphone from the inside pocket of her jacket. Driving one-handed, she selected the cell’s camera and activated it as the now faster-moving sedan was forced by the flow of traffic to pass her. A Cadillac Catera, Virginia plates, child-seat in back, Virginia Cavaliers patch in the window.

  As it cruised by, Natalie looked straight across at the driver.

  Male, maybe in his forties. A long and angular face, short gray hair. Looking studiously ahead to avoid looking directly into the camera, the windows of the vehicle tinted enough to obscure detail. Natalie clicked the camera button as the sedan moved past, and then shot another picture of the tailgate. As she lowered the cell she saw the driver glance in his wing mirror as he cruised away in the faster flow.

  She wasn’t imagining it, she knew. The guy was tailing her. Quite possibly two vehicles watching her, switching places to try and avoid being noticed. A new sense of anxiety swelled within her as she considered this. Two vehicles, multiple individuals, all dedicated to watching the every move of a lowly analyst at the Capitol.

  She picked up her cell again and tapped a quick-dial number.

  ‘Ben Consiglio.’

  ‘It’s Natalie. I’m being followed, Ben.’

  There was a long pause.

  ‘You sure about it, I mean, really sure?’

  He didn’t sound convinced. She gripped the cell tighter.

  ‘Dammit, Ben, I’ve got pictures on my cell, I’m bringing them in.’

  ‘You took pictures? Jesus Christ, Natalie, you sure that’s a good idea?’

  ‘I just drove across the Potomac and back, came right round the switchback and they followed me the whole way. It’s too much of a coincidence, Ben.’

  ‘Holy crap,’ Ben whispered down the line. ‘What do you want me to do?’

  ‘Keep this to yourself, okay? I don’t want anybody to know about this until I’ve figured out what the hell’s going on.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Natalie racked her brains for a moment, trying to think of a way forward.

  ‘Do you think that there’s some way we can figure out who’s behind this?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Y’know, track them down. Run the plates or something?’

  ‘I don’t know. I’m not a cop. I’d have to check if we can even legally do something like that.’

  Natalie focused on the road ahead as she replied.

  ‘I’m pretty damned sure that it’s illegal and an invasion of privacy to monitor the movements of any American citizen without some kind of probable cause, regardless of what the Patriot Act says.’

  There was a long silence down the line before Ben spoke again.

  ‘Let me see what I can do. Just get back here right now, okay? And don’t do anything else that might let them know you’re onto them. Just act normal.’

  Natalie shut the cell off and drove across the Potomac, but instead of heading back to the office she took Ben’s advice and drove to her apartment. People didn’t just pop out for a drive in Washington’s busy traffic, so she pulled into her parking space and got out. A quick trip home to collect something, anything, and she could head back to the Capitol.

  She opened her apartment door and hurried inside.

  Then she stopped.

  It wasn’t that she could tell instantly that something was wrong. It was more like a sixth sense, like the sensation of being watched. From where she stood she could see that there was nobody in the apartment with her, but her keen eye picked up on the dislodged rug in the center of the living room; the kitchen door not quite as open as she had left it; the pictures on the mantelpiece above the faux fireplace at slightly off angles.

  Somebody had been here while she was at work.

  25

  DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY ANALYSIS CENTER, JOINT BOLLING-ANACOSTIA AIRBASE, WASHINGTON DC

  ‘It’s not much to go on.’

  Doug Jarvis stood behind Marty Hellerman and looked at his monitor, where a window displayed the apparently empty files contained on the flash drive Ethan had sent from Idaho. Another smaller window displayed the DOS boot screen and a flashing cursor beside an ‘ACCESS DENIED’ message.

  ‘Do you recognize the encryption?’ he asked.

  Hellerman stroked his top lip with one finger. Barely out of his teens, he was a graduate of MIT and Jarvis was lucky to have him. Most of the promising information technology big guns were hoovered up through recruitment drives by the National Security Agency. Hellerman shook his head.

  ‘No. We could send it to NSA.’

  Jarvis shook his head. His recent meeting had reminded him that whatever was going on in Idaho had repercussions that affected a great deal more of the American intelligence community than just the DIA. Somebody, somewhere, was hiding something, and while it was easy to assume that the CIA were behind it, it was just possible that they were as much in the dark as anybody. The thought of that sent a tremor of apprehension down his spine. If not the CIA, then who – and why?

  ‘Where the hell does some kid from the backwoods get encryption good enough to stop a professional code-breaker?’ Jarvis mused. ‘Even for a moment?’

  Hellerman waved a hand airily about as he replied.

  ‘You’d be surprised. Sure, we’ve got top-notch decryption software and access to super-computers, but all of it’s for nothing if an entirely new code is generated, something unique. Think about it. All a code or encryption really represents is the means to conceal a message within randomness. As true randomness is very hard to generate in any system, so clues and hints to decoding the encryption can be found.’ Hellerman swiveled around in his chair. ‘But if somebody encodes their data based on some piece of encryption derived from, say, private events in their personal life, then there’s no baseline from which we can begin decryption because we know nothing about their personal lives. There’s no pattern to follow, and so the code becomes, in essence, unbreakable.’

  Jarvis peered at the monitor.

  ‘So if I created a code based upon the number of times I’ve been to the dentist, it would be unbreakable?’

  ‘If you broke those visits down into individual times, plus say the length of the visit and then formulated a way to convert that data into strings of characters, then yes, it could be unbreakable,’ Hellerman agreed. ‘There would probably be a pattern that would emerge somewhere within the data, perhaps because most visits would last roughly the same amount of time or occur at regular intervals, but if you then added another layer of encryption like a simple character cipher even that pattern might cease to exist.’

  ‘The individual who owned this data was a computer geek,’ Jarvis said, and saw Hellerman raise an eyebrow. ‘No offence. He might have been able to encode stuff but he doesn’t have the profile of somebody who would go to quite such lengths to hide this informat
ion or even have the knowledge to do so.’

  Hellerman smiled up at him.

  ‘And yet he did, so whatever’s on here he considered important enough to hide well enough that even we’re not getting in here. There must be a key, Doug – something that can get our encryption software started. Once we find it, my guess is that your code will be cracked in seconds. But we can’t do that from here. It’ll be down to your guys on the ground to figure out what the key is.’

  Jarvis searched his memory for the details of the file that had been handed to him by the FBI agents assigned the case. Having written it off as a cut-and-dried multiple homicide, he had made it his business to read the file from front to back before contacting Ethan Warner.

  ‘The geek’s name was Randy MacCarthy,’ he said to Hellerman. ‘This guy was right out there, if you know what I mean. He’d been busted by the local PD a couple of times for possession of cannabis but nothing serious. What made him stand out to local law enforcement was his conviction that there was a sinister government conspiracy at work in his area.’

  ‘Another one?’ Hellerman said. ‘Let me guess: CIA covert ops? Corrupt FBI agents? Buried alien remains?’

  Jarvis decided it best not to mention Ethan Warner’s recent investigations in Israel’s Negev Desert.

  ‘Randy MacCarthy claimed that he had photographic evidence of government agents at work in and around Riggins, Idaho. Thing is, when he said this the local Sheriff’s Department hauled him in and held him at their station for nearly forty-eight hours without charge.’

  Hellerman blinked in surprise.

  ‘Maybe an overzealous sheriff?’

  ‘Sheriff’s as clean as can be,’ Jarvis replied. ‘No complaints from people on his watch in the last twenty years.’

  Hellerman thought for a moment.

  ‘Outside influence? Maybe this Randy really was onto something and the local sheriff is under some kind of leverage?’

  Jarvis inclined his head thoughtfully.

  Fact was, when the security and intelligence agencies went to work on or with local law enforcement, they normally got the cooperation they required without complaint or condition, not because of jurisdiction but because the police were happy to have the help. Although inter-departmental rivalry was a real factor, it did not manifest itself in the manner of a TV cop show, with rival department heads or conflicting agents thrashing it out on the street. It was more of a behind-closed-doors kind of deal: withheld information, confiscated data and suchlike. Everybody wanted to catch the bad guys, but nobody wanted somebody else to get there first.

  ‘It’s not impossible,’ he conceded. ‘Problem is, why? Randy would have had to uncover the mother of all national secrets to get himself killed by a military or government agency. I mean, this is Idaho. There’s nothing of ours there that would generate any real interest, just a few airbases and training grounds, none of which is hard to find.’

  Hellerman thought for a moment.

  ‘Maybe whatever’s there isn’t on the official list,’ he suggested. ‘Maybe this guy Randy stumbles upon it, takes a few photographs or whatever, and then hightails it out of there. He hides the evidence but then blabs about it to anybody who will listen to his conspiracy theories.’

  Jarvis frowned.

  ‘Randy rarely left the house as far as we can make out,’ he said slowly, and then it hit him. ‘But his brothers were hunters and woodsmen, always out and about. If one of them had seen something or taken photographs . . .’

  ‘Then Randy would have been able to encrypt them, but maybe not been able to keep his mouth shut about what they contained.’

  ‘Because he didn’t have direct access to whatever was seen,’ Jarvis enthused. ‘He wouldn’t have feared whatever it was as much as the other witness, the one who took the pictures.’

  Hellerman nodded.

  ‘Then all three brothers get taken out, but one survives and his story is too incredible to believe so he gets put inside for it.’

  Jarvis let the pieces fall together inside his head. It was a wild story, but if any one piece of evidence stood up then they could pursue it and maybe uncover the key they needed to access Randy MacCarthy’s images.

  Jarvis gestured to the screen.

  ‘Keep working that through our filters, maybe we’ll get lucky.’

  As Hellerman got back down to work, Jarvis pulled out his cellphone and dialed a number. He checked his watch: a quarter of five. Ethan and Lopez would probably have met up with the military team that Director Mitchell had assigned to the case, but they still might be within range enough to . . .

  The line cut dead in Jarvis’s ear and he lowered the cellphone.

  They were already out in the forests, which would make communication difficult even with the advantage of satellite phones and the escort team’s advanced radios. Jarvis decided to change tack and try to figure out what the CIA might have an interest in all the way up in Idaho.

  26

  NEZ PERCE NATIONAL FOREST, IDAHO

  Ethan Warner pushed up with his right leg around the edge of a massive gray boulder that was lodged deep into the hillside, the damp, dark surface sheened with rainwater. The incessant drizzle dripped in a symphony of tiny splashes through the gloomy forest of Ponderosa pines around them as they climbed into the mountains.

  To his right, far below, a churning river gouged its silent way through a canyon, much of its course lost beneath wreaths and ribbons of cloud drifting through the cold air.

  ‘Does it ever stop raining here?’ Lopez asked, her voice sounding tiny.

  Duran Wilkes, his graying features semi-concealed behind the hood of his waterproof jacket, shook his head.

  ‘Not so much at this time of year. You get used to it after a while.’

  ‘That so?’ Lopez mumbled, picking her way around a fallen tree trunk thickly laced with damp creepers and vines. ‘Hard to believe.’

  The team of soldiers were fanned out in a loose wedge formation ahead of them, the troops apparently oblivious to the cold and the wet as they advanced with their weapons held at port-arms before them, safe but ready. Behind the soldiers labored Dana and Proctor, hindered by their lack of physical fitness but equally driven forward by their enthusiasm. Ethan and Lopez trailed them by a dozen yards, alongside Duran and Mary Wilkes.

  ‘Who called those guys in?’ Mary asked, gesturing ahead to the troops.

  ‘They were sent as protection by our boss,’ Ethan explained. ‘At least two people have died out here at the hands of something extremely strong and aggressive. We didn’t want to take any chances and risk lives, ours or yours.’

  Duran Wilkes snorted beneath his hood.

  ‘Mighty thoughtful of you, son,’ he muttered, ‘but I’ve been walking these hills for the best part of sixty years and whatever’s hiding out here, a few pop-guns aren’t going to stop it.’

  ‘Bears, you mean?’ Lopez asked.

  ‘Black bears,’ Duran nodded, ‘elk, raccoons, cougars. There’s plenty of critters out here that’ll attack humans if they feel threatened, but they’re fine if they’re left alone.’ He gestured up ahead to the soldiers. ‘Those trigger-happy goons, waving their weapons about, will be the first to get hit if they stumble across a sleeping bear.’

  Ethan decided not to say anything. Kurt and his men were from the National Guard, which to some people was held in the same regard as the Boy Scouts. But in reality the guard was highly trained, highly motivated and often manned by former regular soldiers. They were far from amateur.

  ‘They’re here to protect us,’ Lopez said. ‘I don’t suppose they’ll lead us into danger.’

  ‘They already are,’ Duran said.

  Ethan looked at the old man. ‘What do you mean?’

  Duran didn’t reply, instead giving a low whistle that sounded like a bird but immediately caught the attention of the soldiers. Lieutenant Watson looked over his shoulder and raised his hand to halt his men as Duran beckoned him back.

  ‘Wh
at is it?’ Kurt Agry demanded as he joined them alongside Watson.

  ‘Light’s getting low,’ Duran pointed out. ‘We need to find shelter before dark.’

  ‘We’ve got that covered,’ Kurt snapped in reply. ‘We know what we’re doing.’

  ‘Then you’ll know that we’re close to the six-thousand-foot line,’ Duran said.

  Lieutenant Watson looked at the old man. ‘So?’

  Duran leaned on his cane and gestured around them at the dense forest.

  ‘All of the attacks that have gotten your friends here so excited have occurred above the six-thousand-foot line in these mountains. Nobody has been killed in the lowlands. Whatever it is you people think you’re hunting for, this is where it lives.’

  The scientists and soldiers had fallen back to listen, and Dana wasted no time.

  ‘Great, we should set up the motion sensors and cameras around any camp we make, and start working out a watch-rota.’

  ‘We’re not camping here,’ Kurt said. ‘We can make another five hundred feet before dark, enough to get us into some open country.’

  Duran Wilkes shook his head.

  ‘You’ll lose the cover of the woods from the rain if you do that,’ he replied. ‘And it’s colder out in the open.’

  Lieutenant Watson offered Duran a reassuring smile.

  ‘Clear fields of fire are more important to us than staying warm.’

  ‘Fields of fire against what?’ Duran asked. ‘You haven’t been attacked, so why would you need them?’

  ‘We’re done here,’ Kurt uttered before Watson could reply, and turned to the men. ‘Move out! Half an hour more, then we start looking for good ground for our LUP.’

  The soldiers responded instantly, melting back into their wedge formation and advancing through the forest.

  ‘What’s an LUP?’ Mary Wilkes asked as they began following the troops.

  ‘Laying-Up-Point,’ Ethan replied. ‘A camp, basically.’

  ‘Easier just to say that, isn’t it?’ she suggested.