John Shirley - Watch Dogs - Dark Clouds

“How many people are on your payroll?”

“A few too many lately. I’m going to be pruning that back. Someone seems to have found out about my meeting with you. Someone on my team. I don’t know who. I didn’t tell anyone. But they must’ve…”

He didn’t seem to want to say what they “must’ve” done.

“How do you finance this payroll?”

“I steal from bad guys. Through hacking.”

“Like—who?”

“Like meth dealers. After I’ve skimmed enough from people like that, I turn them over to… well, I have people I get the information to, occasionally. Even certain people in the FBI, now and then. They sometimes act on my information and sometimes don’t. But it salves my conscience to tell them…”

“I’m down on conscience. I’ve been screwed over by my own conscience. And my dad was screwed over by his.”

“Yes. I know he was. I remember. That’s one of the reasons you’re where you are at this moment—and it’s one of the reasons I’m going to do what I’m going to do.”

“Which is what?”

“If I decide it’s safe to do it, I’m going to give you a very special tool, to help you in your… your personal mission. At least, I think that’s what I’m going to do… But I need more information.”

“About?”

“About what you were doing in the Four Clubs, and why Roger Verrick is being so secretive about trying to find you. Why he’s using every covert technology at his disposal to find you. I heard you talking about some of it when you were with Verrick—I was tracking you all that day. I read some of your military files… but I didn’t get a clear picture. I want to hear the full story, Mick.”

“You mean—now?”

“Yeah. Now. This line is secure, I promise you. Every packet from that room is being switched and repacketed and routed again and encrypted and then repacketed before it gets to me. And vice versa.”

“Maybe. But…” Could he trust Pearce that far? He’d hoped to get some help from him—but should he tell him everything? “Pussler says I owe you bigtime. What is it I have to do for you?”

“I have a feeling our missions are going to converge, Mick. I got a ctOS shot of you talking to a cop, a police detective named Tranter. I got a lip reading program giving me part of what he said. Which had to do with his advice on you not having anything to do with me. Now why is he telling you that? When I checked him out, I found out he’s connected to Verrick. He’s been having meetings with Roger Verrick—meetings Tranter doesn’t put on his police log. Roger Verrick, whom you nearly shot last night. Tranter seemed to know all about that attempt to kill me, judging by his warning to you. Seems like we just might have the same enemies.”

“But there is something you want…”

“Lots of somethings, probably. First off… I had a scrambler on the cameras, that whole block we were on, where they tried to shoot me. So they couldn’t see me. But they’d followed me there… Trouble with that scrambler, I didn’t get an image of the guy taking the shot at me. But I did get one of the van going down the street, and where it ended up. I traced it to a train station. He got out and I lost him in the crowd after that. Never did get a real good look at him. But I did get a shoddy image when he got out of that van. Not enough for ctOS facial recognition programs. Still… from what I understand, you’re an expert on satellite picture enhancement. Is that right?”

“More or less.”

“I hope it’s more. Same enhancement issue. You know where to get any software relating to that? Something you could use?”

Wolfe snorted. “It’s on my laptop! I knew they were coming to arrest me, in Somalia—so I uploaded stuff that might be useful. Put it up in my own little corner of the cloud. And when I got out of jail I downloaded it onto my laptop. Which I swiped from… well, it doesn’t matter where I swiped the laptop from.”

“You stole a car the other day, too.”

“Yeah. I did.” He decided not to ask how Pearce knew that. “After they busted me, on a bogus pretence, I stopped caring much about the law. But I don’t make a profit on stolen cars, if that’s what you mean. I just borrow them now and then and leave them where they can be found. One of them had a laptop in it that hadn’t been used much…”

“I’ve been known to borrow a few cars myself. Listen—one thing I need from you is to take the scrappy image of the shooter who nearly took my head off. See if you can use that program and your experience to enhance it.”

“I can do that.”

“I’m transmitting it to the PC there. Upload your software to the PC—see what you can do.”

“That PC doesn’t seem to have wifi—”

“I have my own, for that apartment—when I want it to be there.”

“It’ll take me time to run the enhancement.”

“Then do it after you tell me your story…”

“I still feel funny talking to a television.”

“You’re talking to me, Wolfe. Go on. What happened in Somalia?”

Wolfe thought about it. He’d probably be dead now, if it weren’t for Pearce…

Wolfe took a sip of Scotch, and then he took the leap. “I was in an air conditioned trailer, on a CIA black ops base….”

I was in an air conditioned trailer, on a CIA black ops base, when I saw the takedown.

I shouldn’t be talking about the base, Pearce, but I’ll tell you this much: it was pretty well camouflaged on a little Yemeni island called Socatra, in the Gulf of Aden, couple hundred miles off the coast of Somalia. I was Army, Delta Force, not CIA, but we worked closely with the spooks and shared a lot of runways. Special Activities Division, Special Operations Group—I rubbed elbows with all those guys out there. Spook soldiers.

I was running surveillance drones over a compound about five klicks south of the eastern edge of Mogadishu. This was pure surveillance—no weapons on this kind of drone. Keeping it unarmed made it smaller, better for staying covert. I used the drones and the satellite surveillance detailing program to look for possible al Qaeda operatives, and now and then for some of those Gulf of Aden pirate dhows.

I remember being tired of that cramped trailer under its green and black cammie netting; tired of the monitors, tired of wearing the headphones. I was good at what I was doing. I was good at anything digital, electronic, computerized, remote controlled, so that’s how I ended up there. But I was starting to miss working in the field. When I was sent on missions into the field I used to set up likely sniper targets using infrared gear. I had to sneak a good distance in-country for that, all on my lonesome. Scary as hell but at least it wasn’t boring. Not like sitting in a trailer staring into monitors.

Before I was stuck in the trailer, I got caught out with my ass hanging out three times, when I was in the field—and three times I was lucky enough to fight my way back to the exfiltration point. Another time I saw the enemy moving some prisoners of war, a small group of Navy SEALS. I went outside my orders, took out the al Qaeda guards, got the POWs out of there, and the brass gave me a Silver Star for that. Not a year later the same guys who’d given me the medal were throwing me in the federal slammer.

Why did I get the slammer? It’s because of what I saw when I went outside my briefing in my last drone operation. Guess who gave me the briefing? Major Roger Verrick: “You search this area, Wolfe, don’t go outside it, we’re not risking another drone. Don’t get cowboy with those drones. You know what those things cost?”

He’d given me a much smaller area than usual. It bothered me. I was fully vetted, I had top access, it was like he didn’t trust me to see some operation.