Tossing the Dice
Two days went by waiting for a response from the man in the suit. It was unlike him to simply not acknowledge a request for instructions. Hans instructed Vladimir to start watching the outbound messages closely from the email hub. The surveillance team had been watching the progress of each new trainee and taking very detailed notes about how security was set up. Live video and sound feed had been a good idea. As soon as the trainees had gone to sleep with their machines on, the team called Hans, who called Vladimir. In under an hour Vladimir had installed all his software on their machines and could monitor them at will. Each time they started they would be hitting the ping server he was running.
On the following day, email started coming in to the first trainee’s machine. The surveillance team made copies of all video and sound footage for the past four days. They hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary, but perhaps the rest of the team could spot it. A copy was put on the operation’s server so Vladimir could access it. Everyone was frantically looking for what caused the switch in hub addresses. Nobody was finding the email with the message.
Hans had some technical skills, but he knew he couldn’t play at the level of either the Brit or Vladimir. Five different email addresses were now transmitting messages to the new hub. Everybody was grinding through those messages byte by byte. Vladimir was going through the messages as they appeared on the ping server he was running. Absolutely nothing was showing up. Hans sat there watching the surveillance video looking for something out of the ordinary. He could find nothing. Then again, there was a lot of dead time, so he started keeping a time-index spreadsheet while going through. At least it would save others the trouble of fast-forwarding through the dead time.
Everyone was taken quite by surprise when the man in the suit walked in.
“I didn’t expect to see you here,” said Hans.
“It’s nice to walk in and see everyone so hard at work,” replied the man in the suit. Yes, even here, he wore his suit. “Catch me up.”
“We are all poring over the last few days of messages from one hub operator before they started going to another hub operator. Well, I’m watching the surveillance video to see if they made any phone calls or did anything unusual. The Brit is well beyond me in the tech world. So far, we cannot find what is triggering the cell members to send email to the new location consistently. They flash cut to the new hub and haven’t slipped up sending email to the old since.”
The Brit stood up, stretched, cracked his neck and back then said, “I need to walk around. I really need a proper pint when I’m doing this kind of digging. I can’t find anything in the image that contains the new email address or any instruction to switch. According to our translation script, these are the regular communications that go back and forth.”
“Let me take a look at the email,” said the man in the suit.
“Be my guest. I’ll start you off the way it appears when viewed in an email reader.”
“Please turn off full header viewing.” A couple of clicks later a normal email screen displayed the message. The man in the suit read the message and began to chuckle. “What is so funny?” asked the Brit.
“Whenever my best minds can’t find something, they are generally “overlooking a stupid.” In this case you gave your opponent too much credit. The new email address is in the ‘reply-to’ and the Holy Quran quote is what tells them to use it while deleting the other.”
“I don’t read Arabic, what does it say?”
As for those who disbelieve in our communications, We shall make them enter fire; so oft as their skins are thoroughly burned, We will change them for other skins, that they may taste the punishment. (4:56)
“You were busy looking for an umbrella gun when all they used was a club.”
“It couldn’t be that bloody obvious!” screamed the Brit. “I really need a bloody pint now! Why can’t we ever be stationed in a country that drinks?”
The man in the suit simply smiled and walked over to the carry-on bag he had brought with him. He opened it up and began taking out bottles that were wrapped in towels. Six bottles of Bass Ale. The Brit was absolutely drooling. “They aren’t cold, but they are yours,” the man in the suit said.
Hans had stopped typing his email to Vladimir to watch this show. The man in the suit didn’t drink and was against it entirely. He must have feared for his life buying beer and bringing it here. The Brit was already gathering every big container they had to put cold water from the well in. Hans had to laugh.
Nothing diminished the Brit’s performance like the lack of a proper pint. He was OK for a week or so, but then he was hard to be around. He never got drunk when he was in the field. He simply needed a proper pint at the end of the day to keep himself functioning. It literally was just one pint. Hans had never met anyone who could stop at one beer until he met the Brit.
The man in the suit walked over to him and saw what he was typing. “Do you need me to repeat the phrase he asked?”
“Please do,” Hans responded. “Sorry, I was being amused and forgot what the phrase was.”
With the message recited and the email off to Vladimir, he turned to the man in the suit and asked, “Did you bring orders for the nab?”
“We are cleared to nab these hub operators and to run the hub for a while if we think it will benefit us. I don’t really see how now that we have found what we were looking for, but that much is cleared.”
“Starting today, I had most of the surveillance team monitoring the trainer. We want to nab whoever brings the identities.”
“That we do!” chimed in the Brit. “They have an actual identity shop cranking those things out and I want a crack at finding out where they are made.” All the while he was speaking he was spinning one bottle slowly in a bucket of cool water. The rest were soaking in a pail.
“I thought you would be trying to prove him wrong,” smirked Hans.
“Can’t be done. I don’t read Arabic, but that exact phrase was in every final email message that went out. Our previous hub operator had informed us only that a valid phrase meant the recipient should use the email and an invalid phrase meant they were a decoy. Until now, we never knew any of those phrases had meaning. We can prove it soon enough if we let those guys live another couple of days. The second trainee will be receiving a few cells to handle in pilot mode. We will see the same sequence occur with the same phrase and new email address in the ‘reply-to’ address. It is too bad we don’t get a better screenshot with the surveillance cameras.”
“We don’t yet have an exit plan,” said the man in the suit, “so I expect you will get your few days.”
The Brit responded, “I picked up a car which can hide two drugged-out people in the trunk. If you want to take all three at the same time the third will have to ride on the floor of the back seat. It is in good enough shape to make it to Mangalore.”
“Why Mangalore?” asked the man in the suit.
“It is the closest place with a port we can get to by road. We were thinking you could charter some kind of fishing trawler or other boat that could get us out to international waters,” offered Hans.
“Then what?”
“We assumed you had enough connections you could get a Huey to fly out and cable up our guests for a trip to Pakistan. After that, we assumed you had a way to get them out,” answered the Brit.
“Here I have little in the way of connections. I assume you are already procuring the equipment needed to knock them out and get them out quietly. I also assume you wish to do this quietly because you were planning on leaving the original trainer in place for a while.”
“At least until we know the identity kits have been delivered,” said Hans.
“Kits?”
“He has a team that we cannot identify. We have some passive tags, but are trying to get more scanners. We assume they all work with him, but don’t have a single clue as to who they are.”
“I have placed an order with a supplier here,” volunteered the Brit. “I should have them tomorrow along with the chloroform and handcuffs. Of course, one of you will need to check into my hotel, preferably on the same floor so I can drop the stuff in your room. I won’t be able to come back here once I make the purchase. You will have to sneak it back here. We really need a second car, though.”
“Why?” asked the man in the suit.
“The two trainees usually only work for a little while when their trainer is at work, then they go to sleep. Once he gets back he gives them a little more training and they practice while he sleeps. I want to take the two while they are asleep and the other is gone. We can be waiting for the other when he returns from work. Doing that means we want two cars. It’s a long drive to Mangalore,” said the Brit.
“This assumes we can find a ship there, and a small boat to get us out to the ship,” said the man in the suit.
“I won’t be able to return here. Are you telling me you want me to go there and make those arrangements as well?”
“Do you have that level of contact in this country?” asked the suit.
“Pretty close, but another Twinkie will help ensure it.” “Twinkie?”
Hans opened the bottom drawer to his desk and pulled out the Twinkie he had stacked there. He tossed it to the Brit. The man in the suit got a stunned look on his face.
“One of our sponsors sent us some liquid assets in a care package. All local currency so we don’t stand out any more than is necessary.”
“Does he have another care package available?” asked the man in the suit.
“Only in Indian currency that I know of. Why?” “Oh. I was going to have him ship one to the headquarters in Pakistan to rent your Huey. Indian currency is near worthless in Pakistan.” “If you have another one of these I can get it exchanged for euros,” volunteered the Brit. “They charge a lot to do the exchange, but they don’t ask any questions.” “A smaller brick of euros would be helpful – something I will be able to stash on my person with only a little bit in my carry-on bag. Do you have some loose local currency I can use to rent a hotel room?” the suit asked Hans.
“I feel like a dad handing out allowances,” said Hans as he opened his wallet.
The other two men laughed and the Brit chimed in, “But dad, I’m buying you another car.”
Now they all laughed. In truth, it was the only time Hans could remember ever seeing the man in the suit laugh.
With the money handed out, the man in the suit mused, “It is possible we already know who his team is.”
“How so?” asked Hans.
“It might simply be the other operators. They might all be about to disperse to different parts of the world. Given the loss of Nedim and the rather sudden loss of the hub in Khyber Pass, they might be trying to spread out their hubs just in case.”
“That is a possibility,” said the Brit.
“I don’t buy it,” responded Hans. “He has had absolutely no contact with the other operator since the guy moved out. There is no way for him to know how the training of the others is progressing. He has a team elsewhere, probably at work since that is the only place he goes other than to buy food. Our man inside has learned nothing about what they are planning. The only thing we know is that it is not a suicide attack involving them.”
“Well, involving them wearing the bombs anyway,” the Brit concurred.
“Has either of them had any visitors at all?” asked the man in the suit.
“None,” responded Hans.
“We have video on the one apartment, so we know bombs aren’t being made there. Wish we had video on the other apartment,” said the suit.
“We have a tap on his phone, but he never makes a call,” said the Brit.
“Well, once you have the exit plan in place notify us and we will do the takedown of these three,” said the suit. “It might be good for the surveillance team to occupy both apartments for a few days. If we are all wrong and that is his team, someone carrying an identity kit will show up there soon.”
“It’s a play worth making. We will learn a lot more about what they were doing by getting an image of their machines and sending it on to the technical team,” said Hans.
“We will have to go through it ourselves if we want it done in a timely manner. The technical team has been swamped with computers and cell phones from the British and other roundups” said the suit. “What hotel are you staying in?” he asked the Brit.
“First one you find on this road headed into town.” “Write down your cell phone number and I will call you once I’m in a room.” Paper and pen changed hands, then the man in the suit left. The Brit finished his one bottle of beer, bagged up the Twinkies and was about to leave when Hans spoke up. “I need another case of MREs here while you are out shopping.” “Will do, mate. Why don’t you call the surveillance team and have them bring you some food on their way over to file reports? At least some local bread and bottled tea. You can’t keep much else here.” “Hence my need for MREs, but the bread isn’t a bad idea. It keeps a few days on a shelf.”
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