Rogue Empire (Blake Carver Series)

by William Tyree

  As he got closer to the headshots, he was stunned to find that he recognized several of them. At the top of the hierarchical arrangement was Saif Al-Mohammad, the Butcher of Bahrain. On the row of headshots just below him, the Butcher’s Allied Jihad lieutenants. And below that was Mohy Osman, the monster whose heart Carver had staked in Tripoli, unmistakable for the skunky streak of premature silver hair on the left side of his beard.

  There was one other face Carver recognized: Kyra Javan. And it wasn’t just Kyra’s wedding photo, either. In the photo, she was younger. Her hair was uncovered. It must have been taken before she was embedded with the Butcher. Had they known who she was all along? Carver used his burner phone to snap a quick photograph of the corkboard.

  Somewhere down the hall, two men laughed like hyenas. Carver raised the Glock and chambered a round. “Let’s go.”

  “Just a sec.” The voices were getting closer.

  “If we’re discovered, they’ll link you to Sho, and that’ll be the end of him. And us too, by the way.”

  Eri picked up a tidy stack of files and tucked them under her left arm. She held the Krazy Kisser in her right. They went back through the compound the same way they had come, traversing the ruins of the old resort to the parking garage, around the bamboo perimeter and through the monkey forest.

  Once they reached the far ridge, Eri set the files down in the grass and hunched before them, out of breath. She looked out over the forested valley where the party’s secret lair had gone undetected until now. Carver sat beside her as she flipped through the files. Pages upon pages of handwritten notes, some of which were bound to surveillance photographs.

  “What is all this?”

  “I recognized it immediately as Fujimoto’s research. They must have taken it from his apartment. There might be something here we can use.” She went on, but Carver was lost in the experience of sitting beside her.

  This feeling isn’t real. It’s just chemical. Adrenaline and pheromones.

  Still, instinct took over. Carver kissed her neck. She turned. Their lips met for only an instant before she turned away again.

  “We should focus on the task at hand.”

  He pulled himself together. “Yeah.” He showed her the photo he had taken of the corkboard, explaining who each of the headshots belonged to. “Fujimoto was right, Eri. I think Ito’s inner circle had advanced knowledge of the embassy strike.”

  “But how could they have known?”

  “They couldn’t have. Unless they orchestrated it themselves.”

  The Exclusion Zone

  Sho found Pizza Face in his riflescope, tracking him as he towed the wagon full of mannequins. They seemed to jitterbug as they were pulled over bumpy ground.

  The Eel stood behind him. He lifted the face shield of his suit and lit a cigarette. “What are you waiting for? Dozo! Shoot them.”

  But it was Pizza Face’s head that he wanted to see explode. And then, the Eel’s. But if he did so, would he really be free, once and for all?

  He considered the practical matter of escaping from this wasteland. He couldn’t fly the helicopter by himself. None of the abandoned vehicles on the street looked drivable. He would have to walk 20 kilometers through the irradiated zone to the next town. Even then, he could never go back to his condo in Kyoto again. Or the Blue Monk. Or even the Green Ghost. And even if he fled the country and started over somewhere, would he ever sleep soundly?

  It was anyone’s guess as to how many Kuromaku there were. Hadn’t Carver said they hunted him even in Arizona? Even if he escaped, his mother and little brother would surely pay the price for his freedom.

  Pizza Face erupted over the walkie-talkie. “What is taking so long?”

  Sho shifted his crosshairs to the first mannequin in the wagon and drilled it with one shot. He wasted the others with similarly brutal efficiency. As the Eel looked on, Sho reloaded again and again until he had destroyed all 132 mannequins in the field.

  At last, the Eel said, “That’s good, Kimura-san. Very good. You may clean the rifle now.”

  Sho turned and looked up at him through the plastic face mask. “What about night conditions?”

  The Eel sat in an armchair in the corner of the room. “Not this time. The next job will be in daylight, just like this. You will shoot from a hotel room window, down into a public area.”

  Panic gripped him. The other jobs had been completed at night, in semi-rural environments. Sho had simply done his work and melted back into the cover of darkness. “What about the police?”

  “They will arrest someone else. It has all been taken care of in advance.”

  “Someone else will take credit?” The words surprised even him. Was that pride talking, or stupid arrogance? Either way, he regretted the remark instantly. “Forgive me.”

  But his handler actually looked pleased. “Not credit, Kimura-san. Blame. The future of our country depends on someone else taking the blame for this. I think you will find some pleasure in the person we have chosen.” The Eel paused for a moment. As if deciding whether to say more. “You see, over the centuries, we Kuromaku have influenced politics from the shadows. And we have frankly preferred it that way. Even after the humiliation of war, we held our enemies close.” He stood up now, pacing as he spoke. “As the Americans occupied our country and married our women, it was we Kuromaku who put a Japanese car in every driveway and a Japanese television in every living room in America. How the Americans feared our economic might in the 1980s!

  “My father said those were the good old days.”

  “How they suddenly looked up to our schools! To our work ethic! What we could not do with the sword, we would do with our economy, sucking them dry until they had no choice but to leave. But where are we now? The Americans once again have the best technology and the most innovative workers in the world. China has once again risen from the east, and they threaten not only our territory, but also our economy. And what has become of our people? The veterans who understood the old ways are dying out. Our young men care only about trivial things. We Kuromaku are the only ones who still believe that we can be great again.”

  Sho shrugged. Mostly, he avoided politics, getting most of his news from the more opinionated customers at his restaurant. He had nothing against America. He loved jazz. And he even loved his Winchester. Still, the Eel’s words struck a chord.

  He watched as the Eel got to his feet, pacing as he continued to rant. “Where are the Americans when the North Koreans kidnap our women from our homeland, and then brag about it? Where are they when the Chinese block our trade routes?”

  Sho listened in stunned silence. Then he realized the Eel’s question had not been a rhetorical one. He was waiting for an answer.

  “I don’t know.”

  Pizza Face pilot radioed from the helicopter. “How much longer?”

  The Eel continued his tirade unabated. “The Americans demand fair trade and low prices from our factories. They demand that our constitution remain that of a pacifist country, so that we may not rebuild our own military. Meanwhile, their sailors on their bases make whores out of our women in exchange for protection against the Chinese. What protection?”

  At last, the two men gathered their things and began descending the stairs toward the hotel lobby. Sho no longer noticed the sweat gathering in his suit, or the chafing of the material against his waist. He thought of Fujimoto. Of how he had wept when he heard of the old man’s death. You are just a pawn in a dirty power struggle, Fujimoto had once told him. I am the light that will guide you out of the darkness. Sho had believed him. And he had believed in him. But now Sho suspected that he was part of something bigger than Fujimoto and his obsession with the elections. A movement centuries in the making.

  PART V

  Capitol Building

  Washington D.C.

  Julian Speers and Kyra Javan sat before the 13-member Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. The windowless conference room had been built with the explicit purpose of
protection against audio or thermal surveillance. Kyra had returned to the United States seven short days ago, during which time the U.S. Intelligence Community had filled her every waking moment with physical and psychological evaluations, as well as debriefing sessions held by representatives of various federal agencies.

  Speers had, to the greatest extent possible, shielded Kyra from hostile interrogations. She deserved the country’s gratitude, not its judgment. She had, quite literally, slept with the enemy to protect American lives.

  But he realized he wouldn’t be able to protect Kyra much longer. Following the leak about Kyra’s identity to Al Jazeera, Speers knew full well that this committee, which Speers was required to keep “fully and currently informed” of all intelligence activities, would pull no punches.

  Karen Hernandez, the junior senator from Arizona, had been pecking at Kyra for more than an hour already. “Let me make sure I understand you,” she continued. “You claim that while attempting to flee the city, you were captured by one of Al-Muhammad's men?”

  Kyra nodded with as much patience as she could manage. “That’s correct. His name was Mohy Osman. He was killed during my extraction.”

  “How exactly did he die, Miss Javan?”

  Speers put his hand over Kyra’s mic before she could respond. The last thing he needed was Blake Carver’s name surfacing during another committee hearing. Carver’s vampire hunter act would do little to improve his odds of being reinstated with Guardian. “If I may, Senator, Kyra was being waterboarded at the time. She never actually saw what happened to Mohy Osman”

  “I find it hard to believe that she saw nothing.”

  “Really, Senator? It’s a little hard to see when upside down in a bathtub. You should try for yourself.”

  The remark elicited gasps from the committee. Senator Hernandez remained unmoved. “Kyra, did Mohy Osman say anything that led you to believe that the mission in Tripoli had been compromised?”

  Kyra leaned into the mic. “Just before he put me in the water, he said he always knew I was going to betray my husband. He asked me to confirm that I was working for the CIA. I refused, of course.”

  “So your cover had been compromised?”

  “We may never know. Mohy thought everyone was working for the CIA. I mean, he murdered his 13-year-old niece because she was listening to rock music. He thought the recording was encoded with secret messages from America.”

  Speers’ phone buzzed. He had programmed his phone to remain silent except for messages from his assistant, and she had been instructed to screen his communications and let no one through unless the message was time-sensitive.

  Speak of the devil. The message was from Carver. He had sent a photograph of photographs. Headshots, to be exact. He zoomed in and immediately recognized one of the faces. It was the Butcher of Bahrain. And further down, an image of Kyra Javan. The caption:

  Found these in a covert government facility in the mountains north of Kyoto. Note the absence of a headscarf on Kyra. It was taken pre-Trojan Horse.

  There was also a question: If we coordinated anything with Japanese intelligence, I never heard of it. Am I wrong?

  Speers leaned into the microphone, interrupting another of Senator Hernandez’s questions. “Excuse me, Senator, I need a word alone with Ms. Javan.”

  The senator called a brief recess. Speers rose, led Kyra out into the hallway and down an emergency exit staircase. His security detail blocked off the stairs above and below them. “Give us some Metallica,” Speers told the head of his detail. Soon, an onslaught of guitar, bass and drums roared from the man’s phone. Metallica was always Speers’ go-to ambient noise to mask a sensitive conversation.

  Now Speers stepped close to the five-foot-eight-inch operative, their faces scarcely 10 inches apart. “While you were embedded with the Butcher,” he said in a near-whisper, “how did you get messages in and out?”

  “With all due respect, sir, I’ve already answered that question ten times this week.”

  Speers stiffened at her sudden insolence, but allowed himself a moment to breathe before responding.

  “Of course you have,” Speers said with as much empathy as he could muster. “But when you manage 16 federal agencies as I do, you can only be a mile wide and an inch deep on anything. Will you forgive me?”

  She softened. Her shoulders sagged. “Yes. Sorry. I think I’m just exhausted.”

  “Now Kyra, as you said before the committee, you were not permitted to travel alone. So what tradecraft did you employ to report in?”

  “At least two to three times a week, I would go to the market with the other wives. It was a big, sprawling place. We always had at least 24 mouths to feed, sometimes more depending on who was visiting, so we would divide up the shopping list. Divide and conquer. Then meet back in 30 minutes to head home. There was this Japanese importer in the market. The owner was on the CIA payroll. He’d arrange quick meetings or pass messages.”

  “A Japanese importer?”

  “Yes. The Butcher loves Japanese food. Apparently there were once great Japanese restaurants all over Tripoli, but most went out of business during the revolution.”

  Alarm bells rang out in Speers’ mind. If the Butcher had loved Japanese food so much, why didn’t his first wife, Farah, just learn to cook it for him? She had been intensely opposed to his marrying three women half her age, but relented because the alternative was getting stoned to death by a village of her peers. Still, she wouldn’t have risked giving Kyra any competitive advantages.

  “Were you surprised that Farah let you go alone?” he asked.

  “A little at first, yeah.”

  “How did it work?”

  “The shop owner would offer to show me his reserve supplies. I would step into the back. The first few times, Carver was there to facilitate. After that, the shopkeeper would have a phone waiting for me. I used it to text with him.”

  That was all Speers needed to hear. Either Kyra was lying, or the intermediary was the leak. He signaled to his security detail as he began descending the steps. “Bring the car around.”

  The Green Ghost

  As darkness settled in, Carver gazed out from the second floor window that had served as his crow’s nest. The firs surrounding the property swayed in the wind, but the bamboo held fast, nearly unmoving, as if strengthening its resolve to protect the home and its inhabitants. Aya grazed quietly on a vine that snaked down the garden pagoda.

  Sho’s Land Rover was still absent from the ivy-covered carport. It had been nearly 12 hours since he had left for his outing with the Eel. Carver could only hope that when he returned, he would come alone.

  Time was running out. Carver could feel that in his bones. It was time to check in on Nico and see if he’d made any progress. He logged onto Sho’s private server. Recalling the 63-character URL from memory, Carver logged into the encrypted messaging system Nico had built. He couldn’t help rolling his eyes as he typed the hacker’s profile name, Titu$. Several sweat-inducing images of the Lycurgus Cup – the priceless Roman goblet Nico had asked Carver to get as payment for his services – loaded onscreen.

  When Nico had demanded the cup in Vegas, Carver had hastily agreed to the ludicrous request, thinking that his old friend would come to his senses before any payment was due. Apparently he had been wrong about that. Carver honestly had no idea how he was going to pull this off.

  Putting that little task out of his mind for the moment, he did as Nico had instructed and inputted the 40-character encrypted messaging key. No context was needed. Nico would understand what the code meant, and the messaging system would erase the note within seconds of Nico’s reading it.

  The machine bleated an alert communicating that he had received an encrypted invitation to chat on a second channel. He accepted and opened the page, which was just an undesigned chat window – white text on a black screen.

  TITU$: Hail Carver! Are you in good health?

  CARVER: surviving. any progress to report?<
br />
  TITU$: To what avail is progress if one can’t savor and boast about his individual achievements? My dear Agent Carver, I realized that the challenge you put before me was going to require, shall we say, special effort. But what specifically? I was initially flummoxed by the problem. Then I read in an intimate interview with Chinese President Kang that he has several large televisions in his private office so he could monitor world news throughout the day. While pondering how I might exploit his TV addiction, I had the good fortune to go down to the casino and meet a rather loquacious businessman whose blue chip company had been trying to penetrate the Great Wall of China.

  CARVER: is this going somewhere?

  TITU$: Patience, friend. It’s fairly easy to turn most any Internet-connected television into a hot mic. And TVs that are video-chat-capable can be turned into full-blown cameras without the knowledge of those on the other side.

  CARVER: that makes me feel better about my old analog appliances.

  TITU$: The question of course, was how to bypass Zhongnanhai network security? The obvious answer, as you might have guessed, was to hack in through the television provider. But not so fast. Most of the city gets its television courtesy of companies like Beijing Gehua CATV, but obviously, they intentionally block most international news like BBC or CNN. The President would of course need unfettered access to all those forbidden fruits and more. But who could actually provide that service in a way that did not royally suck?

  CARVER: PLEASE get to the point.

  TITU$: Spoil sport. Let’s just say that I slipped the solution past the Forbidden City gates. For your information, there are 145 Internet-connected televisions within Zhongnanhai. It took time to locate the right rooms, but we’re all set now. So far, I have recorded 13 conversations between Kang and his top advisors.