The Noble Mercenary

by Patrick John Donahoe

  Charmaine had been a trooper until they huddled down in the hunter’s camouflage blind Gretzky’s accomplice had left for them within sight of the runway. Charmaine hugged Jacques with tears running down her face. “Jon was shot . . . I was supposed to protect him,” she wailed in a voice that was too loud.

  “Calm down, Charmaine. You’ll give us away,” Jacques whispered in her ear, and hugged her tight.

  Charmaine’s hysteria diminished. She wiped away her tears with her right hand. She looked into Jacques eyes, and sighed a deep abiding sadness.

  “There’s nothing we could have done. He’s dead. They can’t do anything to him now.” Jacques kissed a tear away from her cheek. “All we can do now is get away. That’s what Jon would want.”

  Charmaine relaxed, snuggled into Jacques’ arms and closed her eyes. “We failed. Jon is dead and Putin is alive.”

  “But we’re still alive, and hopefully Gretzky escaped.”

  Charmaine started to shake, her nerves letting go with the realization of what had transpired the last few minutes. Jacques ran his right hand through Charmaine’s long lustrous hair, and whispered, “Shh . . . shh . . . we’ll be out of here in short order. Don’t give us away.”

  Jacques huddled in as close to Charmaine as humanly possible. She felt good snuggled up against him. He could feel the beating of her heart against his chest. Her heartbeat was gradually slowing down, but she was still in an agitated state. A low growling noise approached from the end of the runway. Jacques looked up to see three black SUVs headed toward Putin’s private jet sitting by the airport control shack.

  The middle SUV’s doors opened, and four men and one woman emerged onto the tarmac, Jacques assumed one of the men in the midst of the group was Putin. He studied the woman’s walk, head held high, with long leggy strides, which could capture and conquer any red blooded man with her air of confidence. The woman had to be Serena.

  The group walked up the jet’s portable stair steps. Two ground support men pulled the steps away from the plane and disconnected the external power plugs.

  The plane’s entry hatch was closed by someone inside, and the plane’s engines revved up. The sparse runway lights went on. The aircraft’s taxi lights came on, and Jacques could see the plane’s control surfaces being exercised prior to flight. The pilot was quickly running through his preflight check. The plane taxied to the end of the runway, and without any fanfare, roared down the runway and took off.

  Putin’s leaving the Sochi area didn’t mean his security team would stop searching for Jacques and Charmaine. Background checks on Jon would reveal Charmaine’s identity as Jon’s sister soon enough. Armed with the guard’s descriptions of Charmaine, the Russians would turn over every rock to find her. If Gretzky didn’t arrive in time to catch their escape flight, he would have to run for his life. Too many of the guards and construction workers knew he had brought Jon, Jacques, and Charmaine to the palace. Enough torture would make him confess his part in the conspiracy, but either way, confess, or not confess, if captured he would die.

  Gretzky had told Jacques that the control tower was normally unmanned, and would be once again after Putin’s aircraft took off. The few functional runway lights were turned off, and Jacques watched as a man exited the tower, placed a padlock on the door, then drove off in his car. The waning gibbous moon provided some light. Jacques hoped it would be enough for Louise to land.

  Forty

  Desiree spent the night in Alicia’s office working with Crackerjack to develop a TOR app. The app would track any email sent from a known computer, from origin to destination, and would include a print capability to print the sending computer’s ID number and time, the receiving computer’s ID number and time, and every computer’s number and time in between, along with the computer’s location and owner’s name where possible of every computer the message passed through. If the message was broken into smaller packets and reassembled at the receiver end, the app would track every individual packet.

  It was gratifying and also frightening to Desiree that all the basic tools to assemble this specialized app were readily available in the NSA’s hacking tools repertoire. She was also surprised how easy it was to counter TOR’s anonymity feature when the sender’s computer address was known, and a tracker app was inserted in one of the TOR browser’s purposely integrated trapdoors. Most hackers installed trapdoors in their software to facilitate hacking the software at their convenience at a later date, TOR was no different, and Crackerjack knew most, if not all, of the entry points.

  While they were double checking their software, Alicia approached their console, and said, “We have the perfect message to send, but we have to send it right away.”

  Desiree and Crackerjack looked up from their coding.

  “A reliable source just informed us that there has been an assassination attempt on Vladimir Putin.”

  Pleased with their good fortune, Desiree and Crackerjack modified their special app to track an email addressed to the Director’s computer from the Deputy Director’s computer and through every server it passed until it reached whatever destination the unknown hacker routed it.

  Crackerjack said, “You’re pretty handy at coding apps.”

  “Well, I’ve had a little experience,” Desiree replied. What she didn’t divulge was her start in cryptography and coding during WWII when she worked on the Ultra Project in Bletchley Park, England. She thought, now is not the time to tell stories, besides Crackerjack thinks I’m 24 to 25 years old, not 934. It’s best to leave it that way.

  Desiree and Alicia composed an email for the Deputy Director of the NSA, Richard Ledgett, to transmit to the Director, General Keith Alexander, with the intention of catching the spy within the organization. The Director and Deputy Director were meeting in the Director’s office when Alicia called to ask for an urgent meeting.

  Alicia and Desiree arrived at the Director’s office within minutes of the call to report to him.

  Alicia took the initiative in the meeting, “We’ve composed an email message for you, Mr. Ledgett, to send to you, General Alexander,” Alicia said, nodding to the Director, “so we can trace the message’s interception and retransmission, and trap the spy within our ranks, who we believe is working for a terrorist organization.”

  “Ever since the Snowden affair we seem to have traitors popping up around every corner. Are you sure about this?” Director Alexander asked.

  “Yes, sir, and the only way to catch him, or her, is to trace our email from source to receiver.”

  “Will you read the proposed ‘catch a spy’ email to me?”

  “Yes,” Desiree answered. “Certain sources have indicated an attack has been made on Vladimir Putin in his Palace near Sochi after the Olympics concluded. Need to investigate ASAP. Our agents attempted to stop the attack, but Putin was fatally wounded.”

  “Is this true?” asked Director Alexander.

  “No, sir. There was an unsuccessful attack less than fifteen minutes ago, which was thwarted by two American agents assigned to President Putin’s security force. We, that is our liaison through proper channels, have asked Putin to lay low for 12 hours so we can help dig into this plot. He agreed,” replied Alicia.

  “Does he know about the spy in our organization?” asked Deputy Director Ledgett.

  “No one knows except the four of us,” Alicia replied.

  “Very well, we don’t have much time then. Let’s get on with it,” said Director Alexander.

  “Desiree will explain our approach,” said Alicia, turning the lead over to her.

  “We’ll send this entrapment email from your computer, Mr. Ledgett. We’ve installed a tracking app which will send each connecting node address, time and location, back to Alicia’s computer so we will know who intercepted the message, the path it took, and ultimately the receiver,” said Desiree.

  “I’m glad we have such talented individuals on our side, but I’m very disappointed to learn we have another spy, or spies, i
n our organization.”

  “So are we.”

  “I approve of your approach,” said Director Alexander.

  “So do I,” added Deputy Director Ledgett.

  “The only way to do this is to use my computer to send the message?” Ledgett asked again for clarification.

  “Yes, sir. It has to appear authentic in all details. We believe the spy knows your computer’s and the Director’s computer’s unique addresses.”

  “I need to log onto my computer.” The Deputy Director typed his log in information into his keyboard.

  Director Alexander said, “I need to excuse myself for a budget meeting. Richard, come along as soon as you’re able. “Good luck, Alicia, Desiree.” The Director left the office.

  The Deputy Director traded chairs with Desiree. “I’ll watch while you compose the message, then we’ll send it.”

  “Desiree, while you type in the message, I’m going to my office to monitor the email’s paths across the internet.” Alicia rushed down to her office, logged onto her console and turned on the tracker app. She didn’t want to explain all the ramifications of what she and Desiree were doing to the Director and his Deputy, because they would realize the spy had been monitoring their computers all along, not just during this one instance. Sometimes it was best to not explain everything in any more detail than absolutely necessary, especially to your boss, at least not until the time was right. The spy needed to be caught and stopped.

  Alicia watched the app’s tracker messages begin to fill her monitor. The encrypted message left the Deputy Director’s console, passed through two nodes within the confines of Building One, but was intercepted at node two and split into two packet sets, one set was forwarded on to the Director’s computer address, but the second set was passed to another computer in the building.

  Alicia stood up and looked out the window into the closest cubicles of the analysts who worked for her. She would have Crackerjack, the only IT specialist she trusted at this moment in time, look up the user’s name on the second address. She would have her internal spy, but she needed to follow the intercepted message’s path to identify the contact on the outside. The message did not sit idly on the internal spy’s computer for long. Whoever the internal spy was, he, or she, passed the message on immediately. Alicia looked out the window again hoping to catch one of her analysts in the act of spying, but they were all busily working on tasks, so the culprit was not obvious. She had a handgun in her desk drawer, but she had never used it. She was reluctant to do so, no matter how serious the crime.

  Desiree entered the office, and said, “I got here as quickly as I could. How’s it going?”

  “We’re getting results. Our tracker app has indicated the message was sent from the Deputy’s computer, passed through our main server, then through a second server where it was hijacked to another server, resent as two messages broken up into packets by an app buried within the second server. One set of packets was forwarded to the Director’s computer, and the other was transmitted off campus.”

  Alicia took a breath and rambled on, excited at the prospect of catching the spy. “The origin packets were deposited in the mailbox of the Director as they should have been, but the second set of packets passed through several commercial servers, notably Google’s, Yahoo’s, and Gmail’s, and in, and out of, dark web servers in an elaborate scheme to disguise its origin and destination. Each of the commercial companies have signed agreements with the NSA under court order to allow collection of emails which may have originated from, or been sent to, terrorists, but this hopping in and out is obfuscating the data’s path. Our spy has guaranteed the difficulty of our gaining access to the routing, but our hackers, you and Crackerjack, are smarter than this terrorist group’s hackers.

  The Snowden debacle embarrassed us when the public found out their email and internet activities were under scrutiny by the NSA. This tapping into our email by an internal spy is another embarrassment. By tapping into our highest level management’s accounts, the spy is gaining access to our latest intel, without all the work of sifting through billions of spam and email messages of no interest.”

  Desiree sat next to Alicia and entered the print command after the last packet arrived at its destination. She walked over to the printer and retrieved several pages. She sat back down next to Alicia, and handed her the last page. Desiree studied the log, listing every packet the email had been broken into, every server it had passed through with time code, and location if available. She noticed some interesting attributes of the passed along message. Whoever the spy was at the NSA, he, or she, had intercepted the email, decrypted it, and sent it out encrypted again. The message he, or she, sent went to a second server and was broken up into several packets before being retransmitted. The receiver obtained an assembled message and decrypted it at his end. The sender and receiver had infiltrated the NSA at the highest levels, and each had access to NSA encryption/decryption software, a wet work penalty for both sender and receiver.

  Alicia sighed a deep sigh. “The printouts give us the internal spy’s computer number and the number of the receiver.”

  “The message was passed on to someone in Germany.” Desiree looked at Alicia, hesitant to reveal the rest. “Both ends have access to NSA encryption and decryption software.”

  Alicia, prepared for the worst, said, “The Director has given this mission SCI Trigraph, Cold Cuts. Only you, I, the Deputy Director and the Director are to know about this . . . and perhaps Crackerjack.”

  Alicia walked out to the bull pen and called in Crackerjack. “Desiree, give Crackerjack the computer numbers of our employee and the correspondent.”

  Desiree wrote the numbers on a post-it and handed it to Crackerjack.

  Crackerjack acknowledged her task with a nod. “I’ll be right back,”

  Alicia and Desiree studied the printout for the seven minutes it took until Crackerjack returned. She knocked on the door and Alicia motioned for her to enter.

  “I ran the computer numbers against our list of analysts and found the owner to be David Egan, a two-year employee, GS-13 IT specialist, and the other turned out to belong to a Konrad Jaekel in Berlin.”

  “Thank you, Crackerjack. You’ve done an excellent job. We’ll talk more later.”

  Crackerjack retreated back to the bullpen.

  “Konrad Jaekel is the name of one of the Select on the list Serena and I gave you earlier. We think he’s in charge of political assassinations for their terrorist organization,” Desiree said to Alicia.

  Alicia replied, almost apologetically, “I didn’t hire David Egan, he transferred to my Division just prior to my taking over. I will have a serious talk with the recruiter who brought him on board.” Finding her resolve, she continued, “But first, you and I are going to arrest Mr. Egan, and take him to our interrogation room. I’ll call security to assist with the arrest. It’s best we make the least commotion possible.”

  Alicia called security. “I need two security police to come up to Room 212 to assist in the arrest of one of my analysts.” She went to her desk, unlocked the middle drawer, retrieved her handgun, opened the bottom drawer retrieved the magazine, inserted the magazine into the pistol, and made sure the safety was ‘on.’

  The guards arrived at Alicia’s office in less than five minutes.

  “Follow me,” Alicia instructed the guards. She led Desiree and the guards to David Egan’s cubicle where he appeared to be watching a CNN newscaster talking about the uprising against President Yanukovych of the Ukraine, and writing a note to himself on his desk pad.

  Alicia pointed her pistol at Egan. “Mister Egan, you’re under arrest for espionage.”

  Surprised by the sudden order, Egan started to rise out of his chair, but Alicia pushed him back down. “Guards handcuff him and take him to our interrogation room.”

  Egan looked at Alicia and the two guards all with drawn weapons, and sat back down without comment.

  “Please stand up with your hands be
hind your back,” one of the guards ordered. The second guard handcuffed Egan, while the first kept his pistol aimed at Egan’s head.

  “Mr. Egan, please come along, quietly,” Alicia ordered.

  He remained in place and glared at Alicia.

  “Now, Mr. Egan.” She motioned for Egan to move out with a wave of her pistol.

  Each guard grabbed Egan by one of his arms, kept him between them, and guided him away.

  As they walked the corridor between the cubicles, Alicia turned to Desiree, and said, “I’ll contact our post in Berlin and have Jaekel monitored. Do you think Ian and Serena could travel to Berlin and assist in Jaekel’s arrest and interrogation?”

  “Of course. I’ll call them.”

  “Do you have any last minute instructions for Ian and Serena?” Desiree asked.

  “Let me know if they need any assistance getting to Berlin. I can expedite air travel for them from wherever they are. Tell them to use Mr. Jones at the CIA safe house in Berlin as a point of contact. Then join me in the interrogation room with Mr. Egan.”

  Desiree walked back to Alicia’s office to make the call. She noticed the other workers peeking over their cubicle walls and, although they were curious, they did not leave their cubicles until Alicia and her prisoner had left the room.

  Forty One

  Two more of Vladimir Putin’s personal bodyguards joined Ian and Serena as they boarded his armored SUV, and were escorted to the airfield by two other SUVs in a caravan, one in front and one behind. Once onboard his private plane, Putin, Ian, Serena, and Putin’s assistant strapped themselves into business class style seats around a small conference table at the front of the cabin. Putin’s bodyguards strapped themselves into the four front row seats. The plane was airborne within a matter of minutes. Once they were on a straight and level course to Moscow, Putin asked one of his guards, a trained sketch artist, to draw pictures of his attackers using his, and Ian’s, and Serena’s descriptions.