Chapter 12
Near Tampa, Florida
Thursday
6:30 a.m. Eastern Time
“Two days ago?” U.S. Army Major James “Kenny” Thompson leaned back in the beige folding metal chair, balancing it on the back two legs. Frank had to squint to make out features of the man’s face and uniform as the large hangar doors behind him, about twenty yards away, were open wide enough for a Cessna 172 to be taxied through, and the Florida sun was causing the major to look mostly like a silhouette. As he rocked back and forth, blocking the light, Frank could observe better detail. He noted both the 1st Special Forces Operational Detachment-Delta (1st SFOD-D) and the Airborne patch on his uniform. He was Delta Force.
Frank decided as the ranking visitor just to sit back and listen for a bit. There was a continuous clamoring and bustling of activity all around them as one team set up barrier walls around them. The walls were soundproofed, about six inches thick, eight feet wide, and Frank was guessing twelve feet high. The crew was pushing them into place and bolting them together to create a large interior room. They maneuvered a panel that blocked out the sunlight from the hangar doors, making visibility better. The panel had a white painted solid core standard door with a push-button cypher lock on it. Frank had a feeling some Special Security officer had required this in order to get Top Secret clearance for the hangar bay area.
Inside the new “room” a second team, an IT team, was working feverishly. They had already connected eight different seventy-two-inch-diagonal, high-resolution monitors on large wheeled stands like rolling whiteboards. There were several printer and scanning stations being set up about the room as well. There were two civilians crawling about the floor and behind the computer stations being assembled, threading cables up pass-through holes in the gray metal computer tables to two Air Force enlisted soldiers who, in turn, were connecting them and powering on the systems.
Frank just watched and continued to listen and wait. He wanted to assess all of his task force teammates and the ancillary workers to determine who he thought would be most useful. After a bit, he was beginning to realize that one young USAF airman first class was the one making the equipment actually come to life and work. She was installing patches to the software and performing whatever computer magic that needed to be done with wizardry expertise. Frank made note of her name, A1C Shannon. Sometimes staying silent and doing some forward recon paid off. Besides, the Navy warrant was doing a great job explaining the situation.
“Yes. Just over two days ago now,” Navy CW4 Wheeler McKagan continued. “Dr. Banks and I have gone over and over the intel sources and the best we can figure is they vanished somewhere into the northeastern portion of Kazakhstan near Oral. From there, we have nothing. No intelligence information from any source or method.”
“Well, they couldn’t have just ‘vanished,’” an Army major with Ranger, Airborne, and Sapper patches commented. “No assets overhead, on the ground, or anywhere that has them?”
“Not according to any sources we can find,” Dr. Banks said. “Our experts across the intelligence community have nothing. Every resource has been authorized and put to work, but so far, nothing.”
“Um, if I may?” A tall skinny civilian in a poorly fitted suit and tie raised his hand.
“Dr. Grayson, no need to raise your hand.” Banks turned to the nervous looking thirty-something. “Everyone, this is Dr. Kevin Grayson with NSA.”
“Um, yes, okay. Um.” Grayson stammered while he tugged at the sleeves of his brown sports coat. He continued to display stammers and tics while fidgeting nonstop and Frank wanted to strangle the man and tell him to spit out whatever the actual fuck he was going to say. “We’ve run all of our filtering algorithms, even some of my own modified ones, and there are just no hits across any comms traffic. Whoever they are, well, they are using highly encrypted capabilities that we’ve yet to detect, or they are being so careful about how they communicate that no filters have been tripped and we’ve yet to spot them. It has only been about thirty-six hours since the HPC facility in Utah has been running on this. Perhaps it is just a matter of time.”
“Uh, Professor, excuse me,” the Army Ranger interrupted. “HPC?”
“Oh, yes, the High Performance Computing facility. A supercomputer. I suspect, perhaps, the most super-supercomputer ever built,” Grayson said proudly. Frank suspected the man wished the HPC facility were a woman, or maybe a man—he wasn’t sure. But he was sure the man was in love with his supercomputer. He wanted to chuckle but thought better of it.
McKagan jumped back in. “The only real lead that might be investigated is this Colonel Lytokov. His is the only name we have. Every agency from here to Moscow has pulled everything in every database known looking for leads.”
“As you all can see, we currently have very little to go on,” Banks said. “We were given this hangar as our tactical operations center with access to whatever we need. The hangar area has been cleared for temporary classified conversations and we have full computer connectivity to the intel networks and databases being set up inside the main offices spaces behind me. Sergeant Robinson here will see to your logistical needs as they arise. Staff Sergeant?”
“Thanks, Dr. Banks.” The Air Force noncommissioned officer stood at ease. He started speaking as though he were reading from a to-do list. “There are office spaces down the hallway on each side. If you are lucky, they have a folding chair stored in it. They’ve been swept and mopped, but, well, these offices have been abandoned for probably a couple years now since the last one hundred percent telework mandate. So, pardon the state of repair. Just pick you a spot for quarters and let me know if you have specific needs. I’m having cots and furniture brought over. IT guys are already connecting classified terminals as well as voice-over IP units in each. As you noted when you entered, we collected all your electronics and cell phones and they have to stay in the lock boxes or outside of the hangar area. Finally, there are bathrooms with showers on either end of the hallway that connects like a T in the middle of the main one. I’m having some general-purpose supplies brought in as well. Again, if you need something, tell me. My job is to make certain you have whatever you need so you can focus on your task at hand. Before you all file out, A1C Shannon here…um, Shannon, raise a hand…”
“Here, Staff Sergeant.” A1C Sonya Shannon climbed up from the floor behind one of the computer consoles she was bringing online at one of the tables surrounding them. Her Afro was pulled into a regulation of two braided tails about shoulder length and her nails, while painted blue, were closely trimmed and real. She had the appearance of a soldier hard at work, but one who got personal satisfaction from that work. She plugged a cable into a slot in the KVM switching box on the desk and depressed a power button. Nothing happened. A flash of realization spread across her face and she smiled again and depressed a button on the switch with a red label attached to it.
At that moment one of the big screens lit up with a red image reading TOP SECRET at the top and bottom. She nodded triumphantly and calmly to herself but then abruptly turned stoic as if she were proud of accomplishing one task yet sobered to the fact that there was an undoubtably long list of tasks before her. Frank could tell that the young airman had that quality about her that was a doer, a leader.
“Thanks, Shannon,” Robinson continued. “She will get your accounts set up and show you how to work the portal we’ve set up for all data pertaining to this task force. If you need help, she’ll also be here to help you set up your certificates for your other classified email accounts and such. One more note I have is that there are a few more task force team members coming to join us over the next few days. We’ll start on their quarters after we get you squared away. My notes show a USAF major, a Space Force lieutenant colonel, and a handful of civilian scientists for various agencies.”
“Thanks, Staff Sergeant.” Banks nodded. “Any other questions?”
There were a few logistics questions. Frank waited silently and continued to listen. There was a bit of discussion about getting intel on the Russian colonel, but Frank was sure that was not going to get them anywhere immediately. If that colonel was careful enough to pull off stealing six nukes and taking out his own soldiers then, Frank was pretty certain, any information that might lead to him was dead, long dead, by now.
They needed a lead. Any lead. Frank wasn’t even completely sure where to start. But like the SEALs say, any hard task is like eating an elephant. Just take it one bite at a time. The key is just to start taking manageable bites. Marines, on the other hand, would tend to just kill that damned elephant and keep moving forward, but only if the enemy were using them as tanks. And who wants to eat a tank? Eating it or killing it, one thing was for certain: at the moment they didn’t even have an elephant.
They needed to know where they were taking those damned warheads. If CIA and NSA hadn’t picked up any communications on the things, then that suggested one of two things. One, they were not communicating or had very advanced tech. Either suggested a well-thought-out plan and execution thereof. And, two, there was no intention of trying to sell the warheads, which could only mean one outcome: They intended to use them.
“Well, can anybody tell me if any of this equipment is actually up and running yet?” Frank asked.
“Sir, this console here and this monitor are up and running. And they are connected to the Intel network,” A1C Shannon replied, looking up from her present task.
“Okay, then, can somebody bring up the last known location of the nukes and this Russian colonel on a modern map?” he ordered more than asking.
“Sure thing, Colonel.” CW4 McKagan stepped over to the console and typed in his username and eighteen-digit password. “Spy satellite imagery has them just at the border of Russia and Kazakhstan above Oral. As soon as this damned thing boots up…”
“There are no other data telling us where they might have gone from there,” Dr. Grayson added. Frank repeated that in his head and wasn’t sure if you were supposed to say is data or are data. He’d always said is data. He thought it sounded pompous whether it was correct or not.
“…Okay, here we go. Here is the image from the satellite taken a couple hours before anyone seemed to realize there was a problem,” McKagan continued as the spy satellite imagery video played. He paused it here and there to make points. “Here is the Topol-M TEL right there and everything appears to be intact. You can see the soldiers scurrying about. And if we zoom in here, leaning against the TEL is Lytokov. The resolution isn’t enough to determine this from facial features, but from multipoint analysis, gait analysis, and knowing the reported heights of the men in the unit the confidence is pretty high this is him.”
“Yeah, yeah. Okay. But I need you to zoom out and show me this place on a map.” Frank waved a hand at the screen. “You know, with cities and roads, and rivers, and train tracks and stuff, all of it marked with a legend.”
“Well, we can start with Google Earth, I guess,” Dr. Banks suggested. “We’ve been looking through the most recent public map images and data but haven’t found anything yet.”
“Okay, zooming a bit over Kazakhstan…” McKagan worked the controls until the map zoomed into a region a couple hundred miles wide with the missile’s location at the center. “How’s that, Colonel?”
“Hit the map layer on.”
“Okay, done.”
“Hmm, there’s a river that leads down through Kazakhstan all the way to the Caspian Sea. Any hits on boats or anything?” the Delta Force major asked.
“Not to my knowledge.” Banks shook her head. “The Office of Naval Intelligence has several taskers open and active right now to look for anomalous gamma ray spikes. So far, nothing. And nobody from OSD, the DNI”—the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the Director of National Intelligence, respectively—“or any other groups tasked have found a thing. These guys are like ghosts. We’ve even tasked HUMINT”—Human Intelligence—“assets in the region. Nothing.”
“Zoom out a bit more,” Frank requested. There were red lines stretching north and south and in several other directions. “What are those red lines demarking?”
“Hmm, train tracks it looks like,” McKagan replied after zooming in some and expanding the legend. “Dr. Banks, could you get any video imagery from assets, street cameras, cell phones, etcetera, along these tracks for the twenty-four-hour period following the satellite imagery?”
“We’ll need to task our contacts at NRO”—the National Reconnaissance Office—“the team at Langley—and Dr. Grayson, could you task the computer for that as well?” Banks pushed an unruly lock of blond hair back over her right ear. “Let’s get through this exercise, and I’ll keep a list. What else, Colonel Alvarez?”
“I don’t know. Something about the Caspian Sea doesn’t sit right with me.”
“Land locked,” McKagan agreed. “If I were trying to get out of there and away from prying Russian eyes I’d want to get to sea as soon as I could.”
“Why not via air?” A1C Shannon asked from underneath another console. Suddenly, her demeanor turned sheepish as if she had realized she probably shouldn’t have been interrupting the senior officers’ meeting. “Uh, sirs? I mean.”
“Airman,” Frank looked expressionlessly at her. In situations like they found themselves currently, he wasn’t one to be a stickler about protocol and formalities. Sometimes, damned protocol was useful and necessary, but sometimes it could get you killed. “We’ve got a rogue Russian colonel with maybe six nuclear warheads planning God only knows what out there somewhere. If you have thoughts about where, don’t keep them to yourself. That’s an order.”
“Uh, yes sir. I was just thinking, why not just fly out of there with the nukes?” Shannon asked sheepishly as she shrugged her shoulders with her palms raised upward.
“Might be too hard to shield the gammas,” McKagan said. “They’d have to be in heavy boxes to keep radiation instruments from detecting them. Be a big enough bird that would stand out and we could see easily. Could be hidden in a cargo plane or something similar, but where is the nearest runway for that type of aircraft? Oral is it, most likely. There haven’t been any hits on that.”
“We’re looking, the Russians are looking. Flying isn’t the right option,” Banks added. “If they’re flying, we or somebody else is likely to find them.”
“Then trucks?” Shannon asked again.
“Well, we all thought of that, I’m sure, but the problem is, once again, we’re looking and the Russians are looking,” Banks explained. “There would be street cameras, Wi-Fi hotspots, and plain old traffic cops they would have to deal with.”
“I’m thinking the Black Sea,” Major Casey Dugan, the Army Ranger, suggested. “Look it, if you want to get to sea, somehow you need to get there first.”
“Yeah, but the Russians and NATO are all over the Black Sea,” Dr. Grayson said. “And the diplomatic situation there is very dicey at the present.”
“Maybe that’s not a bad thing.” Frank rubbed at the stubble growing on his chin. Time to shave, sleep, and eat in any order, he thought. “For them, I mean.”
“How so, Colonel?” Banks asked.
“There are a bunch of nuke ships and subs there in the Black Sea. Plenty of background gammas and stuff. Might be easiest to hide in plain sight. Hell, I know the Russians have nuke subs right there at Novorossiysk, which would be a perfect entry point. But how they would get there from Kazakhstan is another question.” Frank looked at the map a bit longer. Nothing was jumping out at him at the moment. “Trains was my first guess, but I’m not really seeing the pathway.”
“Any other thoughts, Colonel?” McKagan asked.
“Nah. Hell, I’m grasping for anything here. We need another approach.” Frank thought for a moment. “How many physicists and nuclear engineers are there out there that could take MIRVs off an ICBM and reverse engineer them into something useful?”
“Shit, that can’t be many.” Major Dugan nodded in agreement. “That is a specific skill with specific training requirements. I’m guessing less than a thousand?”
“Alright, I think we start there perhaps. Can we get names of scientists or techs or whatever the hell that could do that and let’s start there?” Frank asked. “CIA has to have that kind of stuff? DTRA? Or somebody?”
“Actually, Colonel, that is something I can help with,” Banks replied. “I’ve worked with that group in McLean and the Pentagon. I’ll take that action.”
“Okay, then. Airman First Class Shannon?”
“Yes, sir?”
“Added to all your other tasks, you keep looking at this map and try to think of how you’d sneak out of there without getting caught. If you think of anything, let me know.” Frank held back chuckles. Dr. Banks looked back and forth between them, not sure if he was serious or not. Frank wasn’t going to let on which either.
“Yes, sir.”
“Staff Sergeant, what about the PX, mess, or a pizza delivery place around here?” Frank asked.
“Colonel?”
“Food. Where do we get food? I’m hungry. You can’t fight a war on an empty stomach. No sleep maybe, but an empty stomach, no way.”