The Devil's Ransom, page 5
“What’s four bitcoin worth? Maybe we just pay them off and keep this quiet.”
Amanda Croft said, “Sir, you’ve made it a policy not to pay ransomware attacks because it just encourages more.”
President Hannister rolled his eyes and said, “Yeah, I get that, but this is a little different. We’re not talking about some embarrassment here. We’re talking about national security. It needs to be kept quiet.”
Wolffe said, “Four bitcoin—at today’s prices—is about a hundred and sixty thousand dollars. But the price of bitcoin shifts dramatically on a daily basis. Either way, it’s not cheap.”
Kerry said, “I’m sick of this crap. Is it the Russians again?”
“We don’t know. We’re trying to find out. That’s why I asked for Dylan Hobbes. He’s apparently an expert on this stuff.”
President Hannister said, “We requested his appearance, and he’s on the way. He’s apparently doing a lot of contract work for the U.S. government, but I’ve never heard of him. Who is he?”
“Someone Creed recommended. Spent a career in the NSA working with TAO and the new Cyber Command, then went private sector. He has a clearance, but he’s going to need to be read on to Project Prometheus. I know that’s not optimal, but we need to do this quickly.”
The secretary of state, Amanda Croft asked, “I know NSA, but what’s TAO?”
The secretary of defense said, “Tailored Access Operations. Most of what the NSA does is passive listening to various methods of communication, but sometimes they need entry first. TAO does the penetration. It’s the most highly classified stuff inside the NSA. They’re basically the best hackers in the world.”
Palmer’s phone buzzed and he said, “He’s here. Be right back.” A minute later, he returned with a slender man in tow, another visitor’s badge around his neck. Tall, more than six feet, with gray hair and round glasses that made him look a little like John Lennon, he walked like a stork, all gangly legs and arms. He entered the room and waited for someone to speak.
President Hannister said, “Dylan, thank you for coming. We hear you’re the best at a problem we have.”
“Oh? And what’s that?”
Wolffe brought him up to speed on the problem set, ending with, “Can you help with this?”
Hobbes nodded, saying, “I’m assuming we’re at Day Two here?”
Wolffe laughed and said, “No. We’re smarter than that. We’re at Zero Day, plus about four hours.”
Wolffe explained what they were doing to mitigate the damage and Hobbes said, “Good. Very good. But you also need to isolate the boxes that are infected for me to inspect. Take them off the network to prevent them from altering anything. I want to see what happened when they struck, because they’ll be messing with your systems every single minute. I want to see what they saw the minute they hit, not what they’re now doing to camouflage their actions.”
Wolffe nodded and got on his phone, calling Creed.
President Hannister said, “Can you locate them? Even if you can’t solve the ransomware problem? Can you thread it back to where they are?”
Hobbes said, “Yes, usually we can. When REvil hit Kaseya we were able to locate them virtually and take back their ransom. When SolarWinds was hit we could trace it back to Russia, but if you’re asking for an actual address, I don’t know. It depends on the clues they left behind in the code.”
Amanda Croft said, “What’s that mean?”
Hobbes held out his hands and said, “Sometimes these guys are stupid, and sometimes they’re a nation-state trying to cause havoc. I can’t predict what I’ll find until I do a deep dive into your systems.”
Wolffe hung up and said, “We have a couple of systems isolated right now for you to check out. Can you do this today?”
Hobbes nodded slowly, then said, “Why am I being asked to do this, if I may? You guys have Cyber Command. You have the NSA. You have the heart of the United States offensive capability. Why are you asking me?”
President Hannister said, “Because we heard you were the best. That’s why.”
Hobbes shook his head and said, “That doesn’t make any sense. I dealt in your world for twenty years, and I’m not about to make my company cannon fodder because you’re afraid of using government assets on this problem. I’m not going to be a scapegoat like before.”
The people in the room let that comment settle like a turd in a punch bowl, then Wolffe spoke.
“It’s because what we’re dealing with is very, very delicate. We need someone discreet. We can’t use the usual architecture for this.”
“What’s that mean?”
Wolffe smiled and said, “It’s like Mission: Impossible. I can’t tell you unless you decide to accept the mission. If you do, I’ll read you on. If you don’t, you’re free to go, but I promise, it’s not because we’re looking for a scapegoat.”
Hobbes slowly nodded, thinking. He said, “Okay. I can help. But it won’t be just me. I need a team to do this.”
“Can they work with the code without knowing who or why?”
“Yes, as long as I’m directing them.”
“That’s not a problem. As far as they know, they’ll be working for a consulting business in Clarendon.”
President Hannister said, “Good, good. That will work. I want you to see if you can crack the ransomware code without paying the penalty, but your primary objective is to find out where this crew is located.”
Hobbes said, “Okay, but why? I’ll be wasting time on geolocation when I could be working on evidence for the FBI. Worst case, if we have to pay, they can recover the bitcoin like they did with the ransomware group REvil. You aren’t going to reach these guys in the physical world, but you can virtually.”
“Why is that?”
“They’re always in some place where the United States has no law enforcement reach. They aren’t doing these hacks from the United Kingdom.”
President Hannister glanced around the room, then said, “You’re about to be read onto a specific program that has a worldwide reach, and I’m a little sick of just stealing back the bitcoin and calling that success. I want to know where these guys are.”
Hobbes chuckled and said, “You’re not going to be able to arrest them. I can give you everything I find, but you won’t have enough to stand up in a court of law. These guys change names every month, from REvil to BlackMatter to DarkSide to who knows what. You won’t be able to arrest them or even connect whatever name they use now to what they did in the past.”
President Hannister said, “I think it’s time we made a statement here. I’m not going to arrest or sanction them. I’m going to hammer them.”
Chapter 9
The sun began to dip lower in the sky, and I saw a Caucasian woman exit the mall, about five-six, wearing jeans and a loose shirt. She was lithe, with long muscles like a swimmer, and had a bob haircut, freckles on her face, and a cute little upturned nose. She hit the street, looking left and right.
Knuckles said, “She’s still a heartbreaker.”
I laughed and said, “Go get her.”
We were at what constituted a modern shopping center in Dushanbe, with multiple stores crammed into a four-story building of burnished metal and glass, selling everything from washing machines to work clothes. It was not unlike anything you’d see in the States, with the exception that every store had a purpose designed to satisfy the basest level of existence. There were no frivolous shops selling pet rocks or expensive designer shirts. It was all business.
Knuckles exited the vehicle at a trot, and Jennifer said, “I knew he still cared for her.”
I said, “He does. But Knuckles cares for them all. He just can’t not care. He’d take her back in a heartbeat, because he’s a romantic, but she knows better, because she’s a realist. She’s done with him, but he’s not done with her.”
Jennifer turned from the windshield and looked at me. I said, “What?”
“That’s probably the most introspective thing I’ve ever heard you say.”
“What do you mean? Knuckles is a man-whore. That’s all I meant.”
She shook her head and said, “That’s not what you meant. You’re just too big of a coward to admit to having feelings.”
Jesus Christ. What the hell did I say?
Before I could respond, we saw them walking back toward us. I looked at her and said, “Therapy night is over. Do we actually have a hotel room? Where are we going?”
Jennifer looked at me, squinted, then said, “We’re going to talk about you sooner or later. You bottle up too much stuff.”
I knew where she was going, and also knew she was right. She was convinced that the things I’d done in the name of national security were eating at my soul—and they were. But tonight was not the night for that discussion. I said, “Hotel?”
Jennifer pursed her lips, knowing I was changing the subject, and looked at her phone, saying, “Yeah, we have a few rooms at a place called the Serena. It’s about five minutes from here. Veep and Brett are there now. They picked it for the robust Wi-Fi, which is apparently hard to find here in Dushanbe.”
Knuckles reached the Rover and I opened the door, stepping out and giving Carly a hug. “Not sure why a Spanish speaker is running the show here in Tajikistan.”
She laughed and said, “Not sure why they got you two to do anything about it. Wouldn’t be my first choice.”
I opened the passenger door and said, “You take what you can get. Like getting you.”
She gave me a fake frown, then sat down, seeing Jennifer in the front seat. I saw her face light up, and she leaned forward, giving her a hug. She said something, and Jennifer laughed, then she leaned back again. I really wanted to know what she’d said, but those two had been through hell together, and I wasn’t going to interrupt the reunion.
I sat behind the wheel and said, “Okay, Jane Bond, what’s going on here?”
“They didn’t tell you? You just drove up here in a lather because they asked?”
I started driving and said, “No. I know there’s a guy to get out, but that’s about it. What’s your cover for status here? We’re running around as a bunch of archeologists to get them a UNESCO rating. Why are you here?”
She looked at Knuckles and said, “I’m here under diplomatic cover. Under the State Department, with the cover coming from the chief of station. I came in two days ago as an agricultural expert, and that’s what I’m doing, as far as the government here knows.”
“So you have official creds? You’re not here as a NOC?” Meaning she had backstopping from the embassy as opposed to operating like us—nonofficial cover.
“Definitely official. I’m backstopped all the way through the embassy. But that’s why we need you. The embassy can’t be involved in this. It’s a clean in-and-out. We get this done, and nobody will even know.”
Knuckles said, “Yeah, well, we’d kind of like to know what the ‘in-and-out’ is all about. What’s going on?”
She held out a thumb drive and said, “At the hotel. Let’s get everyone together, because we’re going to need the entire team.”
Chapter 10
Twenty minutes later, we were in our suite at the Serena. After living on the ground for two weeks, I was hoping the place was like the Ritz-Carlton, but it wasn’t. It was utilitarian to the extreme, meaning that the room was serviceable, but was definitely built for some Soviet Union officers. There were no amenities, outside of a few pictures on the walls that looked as if they’d been painted by the maids. If it served a purpose, they had included it, but if it didn’t, it was gone. The toilet paper was like a roll of brown restaurant hand wipes and the bed was apparently built on a plywood stage without a mattress.
It did have a desk with a power outlet, though, and that’s where I found Brett, furiously working a computer, but having no luck.
He turned when I entered, saying, “None of the Taskforce shit works here. It’s like the government has a firewall against us connecting.”
I said, “Okay, okay. We need to get the SITREP in to Wolffe. I’m sure the Oversight Council is wetting their pants because we haven’t contacted them. Keep trying, but I’m not holding up the mission for a report just saying we’ve made linkup with Carly.”
I turned to the room and said, “Nobody use a Taskforce cell phone unless I say. Use the burner phones we purchased. I want nothing from the Taskforce touching cell infrastructure here.”
I got a bunch of nods, then turned to Carly and said, “So, good to be working together again. Now tell me what the hell we’re doing here.”
She said, “There’s a man on the run who’s done more for the United States than any man penetrating the Iron Curtain during the Cold War. I mean this guy helped us more than Jack Strong in Poland. He is the singular reason for most of our strategic successes against the Haqqani network and the Taliban.”
I smiled and said, “Well, from what I’m hearing, that amounted to jack shit. The country is falling apart, and all we’re doing is holding on to the airport.”
Carly scowled and said, “That’s not his fault. He risked his life for us, and we’re going to bring him home. That’s the mission.”
“Why him? Why should I risk my team and my company to get him home? When there are a thousand others to save? Where’s the CIA on this? He’s their guy. I’ve seen the news now. The airport is a shit show. Why does he rate ‘favored nation status’?”
Jennifer saw my anger and stood up, as if she was going to say something. I held out my hand, telling her to keep her mouth shut, because I was a little aggravated at the secrecy. And a little aggravated at how Afghanistan had ended. I wanted some payback, and if sweating Carly was the only way to get it, I would.
She said, “The CIA is doing what they can for the men they recruited. He is just one of them, but we have the ability to get him out of here.”
“Out of what? He’s out of Afghanistan. And you haven’t answered why he can’t just walk to a personal meet with some James Bond from the CIA and get free. Why am I here?”
She said, “Pike, I don’t know. I think it’s because the station here doesn’t have the assets needed on short notice, and you do. Kerry Bostwick asked for you specifically. We know for a fact he’s being hunted. He has no money and nowhere to go. He’ll last about a day on the street.”
I said, “Just like every other Kandak we abandoned, only they’re inside Afghanistan, getting hunted on home turf. So I’m the white knight, saving the one guy to give the CIA some sort of credibility because of the ones they left behind? Makes me sick.”
“Yeah. But you can save this one.”
I knew I was doing the mission, because the guy deserved it, but it aggravated me to no end that the CIA was going to call on me when they could have pulled this guy out months before. I said, “And if I say I’m not doing it? What then?”
Carly said, “He has his niece with him. A small girl. The mother gave her to him to save because she was afraid of what the Taliban would do. He was supposed to take her away. Take her somewhere safe. And now they’re both on the run, here, in Dushanbe.”
I closed my eyes at the words. That’s not fair.
Jennifer saw how her information had affected me, and knew what I was going to do next. I blew out a sigh and said, “Okay, where is he?”
Carly smiled and said, “You really make this hard.”
She pulled out a cell phone and showed me the text messages between her and someone named Jahn Azimi, dictating a meeting tonight at 8 p.m.
I said, “The texts are in blue. This guy has an iPhone?”
“Yes. We don’t know why, but it’s a number in our database. It belongs to the former national security advisor to Afghanistan. We have no idea why he has the phone, but he does.”
I shook my head and said, “That doesn’t sound good. Something else is in play here.”
She ignored my statement, saying, “I found a gazebo on the outskirts of the war memorial at Victory Park. It’s a wide-open space that the people here routinely use for picnics. A lot of teenagers drinking vodka and families enjoying the open air. Perfect for a meet because nobody will try to interfere there.”
I looked at the map, seeing the location was at the top of a hill, a long flight of stairs leading up to it, right next to a cable car system that would save you the steps. I said, “So what’s the mission? You go meet the guy and we take him to our bird down south?”
“Basically, yes. But I need eyes on the meet site before I go in. I’m his contact. I’m who he’s expecting. You guys will be the early warning. I don’t need security per se, because he’s an unknown here, but I want eyes on the site before I go in.”
I nodded, knowing exactly what she was asking. I said, “Okay. Two up top. One at the bottom for countersurveillance. But we can only track one approach. If someone goes to the stairs, we can do that, but if someone uses the cable car, we can’t watch both.”
“The cable car has been defunct for about fifteen years. That’s not an issue. They’ll use the stairs.”
I looked at the map, seeing a road running by the gazebo. I said, “So you meet him and want us to extract via the road? You don’t want to walk him all the way back down, right?”
“Exactly right. The road is blocked with a chain down at the bottom, in the parking lot for the broken cable car. When we make the meet, someone cuts the chain and drives up, and then we drive out the back of the park.”
Brett said, “Why don’t we just drive in from the back of the park?”
“Because it’s a spaghetti road. It’ll take you thirty minutes to get to our location from the back of the park. It’ll take three from the front. I don’t mind the exfil being long, but I really want the initial contact to be quick.”
Which made sense to me. I said, “Okay, here are the team assignments. Me and Knuckles up top for atmospherics. Brett at the bottom for countersurveillance. Veep and Jenn with the vehicles. Jenn, you have the job of defeating the chain for the road. Take some bolt cutters and when I call, cut the chain and come up as fast as possible. Questions?”
