John Shirley - Watch Dogs - Dark Clouds

So maybe I ignored him, and wandered outside the search area a little; yeah, maybe I colored outside the lines. Verrick had been working on my last nerve. Calling me a cowboy, telling me to stay on my leash like a good doggie.

Maybe I should have. But they train Delta Force to think independently.

It was nighttime on the Somali coast, and I was watching the roads from a drone’s eye view, infrared scanning, and saw something interesting: a fairly small cargo truck heading south on a highway paralleling the coast—but it was a truck with an escort. There were two unmarked humvees along for the trip, one in front of the truck, and one behind it.

That looked like one of the CIA’s little convoys. Why hadn’t I been briefed on it?

Then I saw the humvee in front of the truck skid to a stop. The truck had to stop, too, so the humvee in back stopped.

Then four men got out of the front humvee, all at once. I had to move the drone in closer to try to see their faces. They wore paramilitary togs, with no insignia, and cammie blacking on their faces. I zoomed as much as I could. One of them looked at the sky, just for a second.

The driver of the front humvee moved back to the truck’s driver, and had the driver open the door. While he spoke to the driver of the truck, another man moved to the passenger side. Meanwhile the other two paramilitaries from the front vehicle moved toward the rear of the truck. They signaled the rear humvee, which, apparently on their orders, backed up about twenty meters. One of the guys from the front humvee climbed up into the back of the truck—and a moment later jumped out, with an RPG launcher in his hands. Rocket Propelled Grenade…

The RPG gunner had the weapon set up. He fired it straight at the rear humvee.

The rocket hit the humvee solid, right in the grill. The big vehicle exploded—and it was too big an explosion for an RPG: someone had set another explosive in advance, a passive charge, somewhere on the front of that vehicle. Because, let me tell you, Pearce, that thing went up like a can of gasoline under a flamethrower. Ka-wham. Pieces of it rained down everywhere.

The man with the RPG looked up at the sky. Could be he sensed a drone nearby. His glance gave me a good shot of his face. I wasn’t sure, but… Blacking on his face or not, I thought that was Major Roger Verrick, down there.

I caught flashes from the front of the truck and I realized the two men flanking the truck were opening fire through the open doors.

Even from the drone’s high point of view I could tell the men inside were shot all to pieces. Had to be.

I thought about calling in a strike on the shooters, or calling in other observers—but I didn’t know for sure what was going on. If that had been Verrick, there could be an operational reason for all of this. Those guys in the truck and the rear humvee might be anyone…

Maybe Verrick had warned me away from observing this area for legit reasons.

But this sure didn’t feel legit.

The killers pulled the bodies out of the cab of the truck, climbed up, and took over… They must’ve settled down in puddles of blood, on those seats. Not giving a damn.

The two in back of the truck returned to the front, one of them carrying the RPG launcher, and stood by. The truck drove around the parked humvee, and waited a ways ahead. One of the men with the RPG fired at the front humvee. That one blew up too.

Then they tossed the RPG in the brush, jogged up to the truck, and got in the back. And the truck drove off.

I didn’t know definitely who most of the guys who’d done the killing were. I had one uncertain I.D.. I didn’t know who they’d killed. I didn’t know who to turn to.

So I started analyzing the images on my own time.

The faces weren’t sharply defined until I pulled in the analysis and enhancement software. There, first guy who’d looked at the sky—Major Roger Verrick. Second guy, Rafe Callahan.

Maybe this had been some a U.S. black ops takedown. Could be that it was something so classified it had a classification level I’d never heard of. There were rumors of accesses like that.

So I didn’t say anything, not right away. I’d have to find some discreet way to ask about this.

But I had trouble sleeping for two days, wondering about it. Not feeling right.

Then I heard about the al Qaeda attack on one of our delivery convoys. “Yeah, we lost a buncha guys,” Specialist Gamble was saying, in the mess tent, as he speared roast beef and shoved it into his mouth. He was chewing with his mouth open and gabbing at the same time as usual. “Navy SEALS killed, what I heard. Six good men down. The front humvee hit some kinda IED, then your garden variety terrorists come out with RPGs and they nail the humvees and steal the truck.”

“What was in the truck?” I asked.

“I’m not supposed to say…” Gamble swallowed, drank some milk, and then glanced around.

I knew he’d get around to telling me what he’d heard. He was one of those guys who like people to think they’re “in the know”. He was in the know, too, because he was tasked on the ultra-frequency receiver that decrypted intel stuff; he turned it into reports for people in the high access loop.

Now he lowered his voice and went on, “Money! Al Qaeda ripped off more a hundred-forty million bucks in cash. Bundles of cash, piled up like it was nothin’ but notebook paper shipping out of a warehouse! It was going to pay off Somali warlords, see, get them on our side.”

“They shipped it in cash?”

“Sure! Like all that big cash that disappeared into Iraq, years ago, remember that?”

“Uh huh. They never did catch those guys…”

“Well, word is, this was terrorists killed those guys in the trucks and humvees, stole that money intended for the guys who were gonna switch sides against ’em… But listen, bud, you didn’t hear it from me!”

Terrorists. That was the official story. Only I’d confirmed that was Verrick out there—and Callahan.

So what did I do then, Pearce? Did I leak the stuff anonymously? Did I get myself sent back to the DC, so I could slip right to top levels with what I’d seen—what I’d recorded?

No! Like a dumbjack, I went to my base commander, right there on the island. I took it to General Van Ness, and I told him all about it. I gave him a disk with the goods on it.

Van Ness went white when he heard that stuff. I didn’t realize why at the time. I thought he was just worried about guys from his command ripping off money.

About an hour later I was just going over to the drone control trailer when I almost ran into Specialist Gamble—he came off frightened when he saw me.

Whoosh, he turned on his heel and went the other way.

I can read the signs in the military.

So right then I went to the CIA attaché, told her what I’d seen—I can’t give you her name. Well, she stared at me for a long moment after I told her the story, then said, “How about some evidence?”. I told her sure, I’ll get it.

I went to my bunk. The only other copy I’d made of that disk should’ve been in my personal effects case—it was gone. I went to the trailer, looked in the hard drive of the PC I’d used. Nothing.

Then I realized it was not even the same PC. The one I’d used was missing.

I went back to her, told her what had happened. I said somebody was covering up. She wasn’t letting on if she believed me or not. She said, here, fill out this form…

I did. I heard her talking on the phone to her boss in Washington as I filled out the report. She seemed genuinely concerned I might be telling the truth.

Turned out, that didn’t do me any good.

Half an hour later, I stepped out of the Agency’s Quonset, and two MPs were waiting there. They put me under arrest.