An Armageddon Duology (14 page)

M
iller blasted
through the left-most toll lane with lights flashing as he and Savas raced down Interstate 95 on their way to Bridgeport, Connecticut. The NSA finally seemed to be playing nice with the other agencies and had come through in a big way. With their eyes nearly everywhere in the digital world, they had been able to trace the feed for the streaming video of the assassinations to a boardwalk section of the port town.

“Near Captain's Cove,” said Savas, mapping the location on his phone. “Seems to be some minor touristy location by a marina. Move a bit out from it and things deteriorate quickly. A lot of abandoned buildings.”

“Buildings with serious bandwidth, it seems,” said Miller. He cast a sharp look toward Savas. “Rebecca’s where again? We could use her today.”

Savas sighed. “Tell me about it. Look, I know I’ve been keeping this in a black box, Frank, but there are some very good reasons. Things will be clearer soon. Current events have complicated things, but she’s tending to something important.”

“Your call, John. But I can’t say there hasn’t been a lot of interest and speculation.”

“Answers are coming. Meanwhile, we focus on today.”

Miller stared a moment more at Savas, then turned his eyes back to the road. “Sure.”

Savas continued. “We’re going to have local and state police at the scene, and some agents from the New Haven Division. But they’ve saved the crime scene for us, and I’ve got a forensics unit en route. This is our first real physical connection to Anonymous.”

“Well, let’s hope these digital ghosts leave real-world footprints.”

T
hey stepped
out of the car in front of a faded orange building. Sandwiched between several dilapidated and shuttered structures, it hardly seemed the location for the broadcast of the most devastating video in the history of the internet. They were met by representatives of the local FBI division and surrounded by police. Bystanders stood behind police tape, gawking at the uniformed presence, cell phones raised like torches, beaming images around the world.

“Assistant Special Agents in Charge Jimmy Onda and Maggie Linven,” said a tall woman wrapped in a coat and indicating a wiry man with thinning hair. Both of the New Haven agents appeared anxious and fearful.

Savas shook their hands. “John Savas and Frank Miller, Intel 1. I take it you’ve been inside?”

Their wide-eyed expressions gave Savas his answer.

“Yes, agent Savas. The bodies are still there. They haven’t been disturbed. I was told your New York crime units are coming.”

He nodded. “Yes. They should be here any minute. Mind if we have a look ourselves?”

“No. But it’s pretty grim.”

The four of them entered the building, a narrow hallway leading back to what might have been a storage room for a small business decades ago. Photographers continued to take pictures, and the strobing of the flashes in the dark space created a strange, discontinuous visual effect as he and Miller snapped on nitrile gloves.

Even walking in the space was hazardous. Clotted pools of blood had seeped from the center of the room outward, coating the floor in an expanse of red goo. The staging was as it had been in the video: two rows of ten chairs, corpses tied to them, stage lights affixed to stands around the massacred, and a dark cloth framing the nightmare in a semicircle of black.

“There seems to be some rigor mortis remaining in the bodies,” said agent Liven. “That’s consistent with the timing of the broadcast last night.”

“So it was live,” mumbled Miller, a scowl on his face. “Like to tie down the bastard that did this and see how he likes the treatment.”

The accompanying agents eyed Miller cautiously. Savas turned the conversation back to Anonymous.

“That speech on TV sounded like talking points from a manifesto. They truly hated the people here, saw them as criminals and murderers that deserved their punishment.”

“Sounds like you’re empathizing with them,” growled agent Onda.

“Not at all,” said Savas. “But we can’t sit here getting off on righteous indignation. We need to understand them, get in their heads. We need to anticipate them. And we can’t do that if we can’t think like they do. Basic criminal psychology 101.”

A glint of light caught his attention. Moving in a wide arc around the crime scene to avoid the blood, he approached the left side of the chairs and crouched beside a white object on the ground. One side of it was dyed red from blood that had run alongside the plastic.

“The Guy Fawkes mask,” said Savas.

The head of the New Haven division stared between Savas and the mask. “I wondered what that was all about in the video. Who’s Guy Fawkes?”

Savas shook his head. “Too much FBI training is still in the analog years.” He stood up and continued to move parallel to the chair rows, examining the layout. “Historically, he’s a figure from British religious wars in the sixteenth century. Led a failed Catholic rebellion against the English. Fast forward. Now, amazingly, he’s become a general symbol of resistance to oppressive systems. Started with a graphic novel. The hacker community in particular has adopted him as a symbol. Anonymous often uses iconography of him—the mask in particular—when putting a public face on their activities. It literally keeps them anonymous and gives them some kind of mythic power.”

The New Haven agent shook her head. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“Yeah, well, since when do sociopathic revolutionaries have to make sense?” asked Miller. “But the idiot left the mask here.”

“Exactly,” said Savas, a glint in his eye. “And look, behind the chairs,” he pointed with a blue finger. “Some masks from the shooters. They wore them for the entire video.” He smiled. "Maybe Anonymous is made up of geniuses, but their intelligence is limited to the digital realm. They’re rookies here.”

At that moment, several additional agents entered the room carrying equipment and evidence bags. One waved to Savas as he approached.

“Just in time,” said Savas. “Our NYC crime unit. And it looks like Anonymous has left some interesting Easter eggs for us to open.”

A
n unremarkable blue
sedan pulled up to a tollbooth on the George Washington Bridge on the Jersey side. The booth officer watched as a man with blond hair and a youngish face shoved a fist out the window, offering a ten and a five from inside. The officer could see her face reflected in his mirrored glasses. She glanced inside at his companion as she took the bills, glimpsing a woman with short black hair and dark sunglasses. The man looked away as the gate swung upward, and the car dashed off, lost in the traffic swarming onto the bridge.

Lopez rubbed his hand across his face as he steered the vehicle toward the right lanes, glancing upward to a sign for the Harlem River Drive.

Houston smiled. “Miss the beard?”

“Not sure. Just getting used to it. Nervous habits and all.” He took the offramp from the bridge and forced his way into the gaggle of vehicles queuing up for the East Side Highway. “I’m sure we got our photos taken back there.”

Houston stared outside the window at the merging traffic. “The image-recognition solutions still struggle with facial hair, so I’m the bigger danger. We
are
number one on the most-wanted list. Anyone would want to make their career bringing us in.” She looked behind them and studied the vehicles. “These giant sunglasses should mask my forehead and cheekbones some. I kept the visor down as well as we approached the toll booth. Which reminds me: fifteen bucks for a car?”

“Getting a bit ridiculous. Cheaper with EZ-Pass, but we have to stay off the grid.” Lopez grunted. “So how do we fight a digital terrorist group when we stay off the grid?”

“First, they stopped being digital. Rebecca’s encrypted data was informative: Bombings, shootings—nothing virtual there. Second, there are ways to get online without alerting the world to your presence. We’ve done it.”

“
You’ve
done it. But these guys put the Feds to shame. It’s different.”

“They aren’t omniscient. They don’t know what to look for. We don’t exist for them. Not yet, anyway. We’ll be targeted later.”

“They seem pretty good at that.”

Houston turned her body toward Lopez, swinging a leg onto the seat to stabilize herself. “I’ve been thinking about that, Francisco. How the hell did these guys remotely pilot these things so skillfully? They aren’t drone operators.”

“Maybe they recruited some. Besides, it’s not like people don’t know where the Capitol is. Just punch in the GPS coordinates and off you go.”

“And how do you explain hitting a moving vehicle like the CEO’s car?”

Lopez nodded. “Got me there. They’d have to steer it. In real time.”

“Pretty tough with an evasive target. I doubt the best drone pilots in the CIA could do that.”

“Then how?”

“Same thing you said. GPS coordinates.”

Lopez furrowed his brows. “I see. Mobile devices.”

“Right. Even CEOs have their damn smartphones these days. If they could hack into one or more of the Big Brother databases out there, they might be able to get the target’s phone GPS feed. It’s like shining a laser beam for a missile. Even a
moving
target. Individualized. It’s perfect. They were using this in Pakistan and other locations for al-Qaeda honchos. But it should work even better in Western nations.”

“You’re right. It’s perfect for assassinations: auto-piloted drones coupled to the real-time coordinates of the target.”

Houston spun back around as Lopez exited the Harlem River Drive and entered the streets of Harlem itself. “For now. If this is what is happening, you can bet every figure of importance will ditch their GPS-enabled tech.”

“By then, it might be too late.”

R
ebecca Cohen was standing
outside the rundown brownstone as they pulled up. Lopez and Houston exited the car quickly and scaled the steps to meet her at the doorway.

Houston glanced around them. "You're on a burner cell? No GPS?"

Cohen nodded. "As you asked. It's a cheap model, but it makes calls. You might be right about how the hits were made. It's so simple it's frightening." She motioned them to the entrance. "Let's get in and I'll let John know you're here." Cohen unlocked the door and the three entered rapidly.

"What a dump," said Houston. Cohen shut the door behind them.

The wreckage of the former living room was strewn with broken furniture, blankets, and litter. Grime coated the walls and floor. It stank.

"Former crack house that was shut down and left to die," said Cohen as she handed Lopez the keys. “Gentrification hasn’t made it this far north yet.”

He nodded. "It's perfect. I'll be right back."

The ex-priest returned quickly with a heavy suitcase in each hand and a backpack strapped over his shoulders. Cohen glanced briefly at the bags as she dialed. She didn't need any guesses as to what they held within. She punched a key on her phone.

"John? It's Rebecca. They're here. Yes, okay. Go ahead."

She was silent for a few moments as muffled sounds came from the speaker. Meanwhile, Lopez and Houston opened one of the suitcases, removing body armor and firearms. They stripped to their underwear, Houston with a tight sports bra, Lopez’s rippling musculature distracting the FBI woman. They donned tight black tanks and black pants, strapping on shoulder harnesses with holsters for handguns and knives. Cohen thought she saw stun grenades as well in the suitcase, but it was closed before she could be sure.

She hung up the phone and approached the pair. "Some interesting news."

Houston slipped a loose black shirt on, the rough fabric concealing all evidence of the weaponry within. "The crime scene?" Lopez seemed to be tying together a long robe or coat of some kind.

"Yes," said Cohen. "The executions. Looks like our hackers left considerable physical evidence behind in their getaway. The crime unit just went through things and it's preliminary, but there are prints and hair."

Houston's face was set. "Well, it's a start. How soon until we have something?"

“This is priority one. John and Frank are on their way back with them. They'll do this right. Best people, best labs. Everything is nearby. Bottlenecks should be travel time to the labs and lab work. We’ll get the fingerprints first. DNA tests in some hours plus time to search databases."

"If things go well," said Lopez. He stepped beside her.

His demeanor had changed completely. Outwardly, he was covered in black vestments, modified and tightened so as not to restrict his movements. Along with the monastic garb came a stern expression on his face, one Cohen had never seen before. For the first time, she noticed clearly the scar on his forehead, branded there by the hot barrel of a weapon held by a vengeful madman, a circle of white tissue with a cross from the site at the top. It almost seemed to glow.

Cohen cleared her throat "Yes, if things go well. Listen, I want to thank you both for coming. I know you didn't have to."

Lopez slammed a magazine into the butt of a gun and holstered the weapon within the folds of the vestments. Even his gloves and boots were black. As Houston unconsciously moved to his side, Cohen noted how similar they seemed, how coordinated their motions, like two black cats stalking prey.

"Let's get to work," Houston said. "When do we get to meet the gang?"