Mark Young - Off the grid

Willy jerked. “Hey guys, we’ve got trouble.”

Gerrit looked his way. “Speak to me, Willy.”

“They sent out electronic probes, search signals to read whether someone has tried to enter their system through unusual channels.”

“You mean like through a satellite feed?”

Willy nodded. “Exactly. They’re more sophisticated than I gave them credit for. They might be almost as smart as Joe and I.”

“Almost?”

“Yeah, Mr. G. Almost. They can track my signals. They only know that I’ve somehow invaded their system. I see them searching, but they’re coming up empty.”

“Can they track it to where we are right now?”

Willy stared at him as if Gerrit had just suggested the Pope sanctioned sin. “Not in a million years.”

Gerrit looked at the screen. “This still is not good news. They suspect we’re coming and they’ll take every precaution to prevent us from getting inside.”

Alena shifted in her seat. “So what are we going to do?”

Leaning back, Gerrit looked at each person in the van. “We’re going to figure a way to get Alena and me inside. Let’s pack it up and find a motel.”

Alena shot him a look. “I thought we were using the safe house?”

“Change of plans,” Gerrit said. “Just want to switch it up in case anyone has tapped into our plans.”

Collette walked over to where one of her crew sat in the chair vacated by Lab Rat. She leaned on the man’s shoulder. A large laptop, bulkier than the ones most people carry around, sat on the counter in front of him, line tied into the plant’s network system.

“They’re gone, Collette. They pulled their probes back and cut the signal. They’ve vanished.”

She slapped the counter. “They are still in the area because they have not gotten what they came here to steal.”

The man nodded and turned back toward his computer.

Collette fumed. Just show me your face once, Gerrit. That’s all I ask. Just give me one opportunity to kill you.

She pulled over a rolling chair and settled in. They had to come to her. And she would be waiting.

Harrogate, England

Morning was only hours away, but he still hadn’t been able to sleep. Joe O’Rourke eased back on the soft pillows, his legs sprawled out on a four-poster, queen-size bed. The Harrogate bed-and-breakfast he’d found online lived up to its high customer ratings, and it was only a few blocks from the center of downtown.

The grueling commercial flight had been stalled for four hours in New York, and then his luggage had somehow been shipped to another airline. He’d kept his laptop and electronics in a carry-on or they might have been lost.

The lost luggage would never be reclaimed because he could not risk leaving a correct forwarding address where he might be contacted. Tomorrow morning he’d pick up a few essentials. Now, he just wanted to rid himself of this brain-numbing headache that had plagued him since he got off the plane.

He looked at his passport under the name of Frank Malone. Alena created it just before they abandoned the San Francisco office. No one should be able to track him here in England.

Sitting up on the bed, he opened the laptop, quickly accessing his e-mail account, also listed under an alias and an IP address rarely used. It was an electronic dead letter drop he and the others set up to keep in touch. One of many. When the e-mail program opened, he saw a new document sitting in the Draft file unopened. He clicked on it and saw Willy’s avatar on the page with no name. Captain America. He scanned down to the message.

Located site. Set up to watch. G wants you to know that C from the Vienna hotel is here with her people. Watching and waiting. G and his girlfriend are going to pay C a visit. They just need to figure out what kind of gift to bring to the party. Stay safe.

Joe stared at Willy’s note for a moment before deleting. Kane’s people beat them to the lab. He thought of that implication. It was not surprising that they had the senator’s house wired up since they trusted no one. So Kane knew Gerrit was alive and connected to Joe and the others.

Kane must know the gang traveled to Albuquerque based on Summers’ information. Joe leaned back, resting his head on the pillow once again, his temple beating a dull, painful rhythm. He tried to inventory all their operations, all communications, all points of possible invasion by Kane and his electronics. This has become like a Star Wars battle where one needs to worry about more than just linear surveillance. More than just the car tailing behind you or the person peering into your house from a parked vehicle.

Today, everything must be brought into question. When they moved in for contact with a subject or conducted surveillance, they must be worried about a spy satellite thousands of miles overhead or a flea-sized chip tracking their every move. And then they had computers to worry about, an industry that he’d spent most of his life trying to protect people from invasive electronic spying.

People have become extremely vulnerable. Since no one could ensure any privacy, the enemy could use almost anything to spy and invade another person’s private life. Even a person’s deepest thoughts or fears could be scanned and analyzed by skilled interrogators. Advanced interrogation techniques could render anyone vulnerable. What would it take to break him down? How might he be turned?

Joe closed his eyes and thought how easily he’d been frightened as they dangled him in the air, threatening to drop him onto the concrete below. He learned something about himself in that moment. That he could become a coward. He learned that fear could cripple him. Next time-and with Kane there would be a next time-he might be able to stand firm. Overcome his fear. How much could he take?

An involuntary shudder swept through him. He opened his eyes and put his hands on the keyboard. Quickly, he typed a draft of his own.

The Eagle has landed. Operation look-see about to begin.

Richard Kane met his visitor at the door of the Harrogate mansion. Others bustled with activity around them as he greeted his guest. “George, so kind of you to meet me here. Let’s go down to my office where we can enjoy some privacy.”

George Lawton shook Richard’s hand. “MI6 is always here to serve, Richard.”

He smiled and ushered the other man to the elevator. They did not speak again until reaching his office below ground. Once seated, Richard leaned on his desk, staring intently at Lawton. “Any leads on your end regarding my target?”

“This guy Joe O’Rourke?” The intelligence officer shook his head. “If the bloke came in country, he did so under our radar I’m afraid. Checked all incoming flights from the greater New York area, using facial recognition, document profiling, and travel habits. Maybe this guy didn’t come in after all. You think they deployed an invisible in this case?”

Richard raised his eyebrows. He knew what the Special Branch officer was suggesting. They may have used someone from inside England, an agent that could operate inside the UK without arousing suspicion because of their nationality of origin.

He shrugged. “Doubt it, George. When Gerrit came here for a visit, their crew left signatures to indicate they’d tracked him here. You came across some of that intelligence. Questionable documents, similar travel routes, electronic signals caught near our London safe house as well as our chat here in Harrogate. They were slick enough to cover their tracks, but it was obvious they used foreign nationals to run their operation. If they had an invisible here, my source would have known.”

“So, are you picking up any of this right now?”

Richard folded his hands and rested them on the desktop before answering. “As of last night, we began picking up signals. Someone is close and trying to search for any electronic weaknesses we have on-site.”