The Puppetmasters (47 page)

Kendall stood up and slowly turned around, and there, overhead, not ten feet away, was a full-sized male snow leopard. As it crouched in a position from which to spring at her, she hastily and awkwardly grabbed for the handgun. The snarling animal leapt off the ledge right at her. The last thing she remembered was a whirl of spots descending toward her, beady green eyes locked onto hers and, at the last moment, hot breath on her neck.

C
APTAIN QADI SCANNED THE HORIZON
and yelled into the radio. He had received routine status reports of no sightings from several troops that had split off. But one of the groups that tracked the most obvious route had been unresponsive. He couldn’t imagine it had been taken out. Rashid wasn’t that good, he reasoned. Worse, the tracking chips in the missing troops’ radios were silent. Qadi was uneasy as he processed this mystery. Finally, he ordered several troops to backtrack to the last trail of the missing soldiers.

Making matters worse, the search helicopters and drones had come up empty. They had covered the region between Band-e-Amir and the northern border with no sightings. Rashid and Kendall could be dead, Qadi told himself, but then thought bitterly that he didn’t have that kind of luck. General Omar was anxious and pissed that his young swaggering captain had not located the criminals. The leader decided to hold his tongue for now and refrain from threatening the captain for another day. Instead, he urged him on and offered more ground troops.

Qadi accepted the extra troops and specified they be sent to the western part of the Sar-i Pul Province in case the couple on the run were headed to the western border with Turkmenistan. The captain specifically wanted troops to scour the cities of Sar-i Pul, Maymana, and Shibirghan. The last one had a direct route and was closest to Mazar-e-Sharif. The general pointed out that the troops would be spread all over the northwestern area of Afghanistan. There was no concentration of troops at any one location. He knew that was not a good idea, particularly if they were up against a worthy opponent like Rashid. That man was known to be patient and would use stealth and intelligence to best his adversary.

The general sighed at the seemingly unorganized nature of the search and bitterly blamed President Shazeb for not investing in the infrared equipment that would have been of enormous help to the air search crews. But the former president was too busy diverting natural gas revenues into his own pockets and
seeing to his personal business interests. Besides, he had always told Omar there were no other countries at their doorstep. Afghanistan had finally been left to its own devices. It didn’t need to waste money on electronic toys it had no use for. The only unruly citizens were the independent nomads who only cared about their immediate families and the nomads’ very survival.

The Afghan troops had been run ragged for over a week now, and didn’t seem to be much help. The pair on the run were either blending in well with the local tribes they ran across, or they were handling the mountain trek by themselves with no problem.

When Omar received word of the missing soldiers, he refused to believe they were taken out by Rashid. He told himself the guy was dragging behind him a slow animal and a silly female who would be of no help. It wasn’t like they were an experienced combat team. There also had to be a rational explanation for why the radios were not working. He advised the young captain not to worry, and offered the theory that the troops probably fell in the water and got their radios wet and were simply unable to communicate. Omar was not going to be made a fool of. Therefore, he refused to even ponder the untimely demise of his soldiers. That they would have been ambushed was unthinkable.

Mossad leader Benjamin Zimmerman was incensed when he got the word that Israel’s satellite had been destroyed by an unknown saboteur that had brilliantly built an army of clones using proxy servers all over the world that were impossible to trace back to a single source. Israel’s best computer experts would do the painstaking investigation to reverse engineer the act, but it would take days, if not weeks.

This time Zimmerman knew it couldn’t have been Rashid. He was on the run or dead, and he certainly didn’t have any computers at his disposal. The older man wouldn’t even try to blame the young man. Everyone within the tight Mossad agency knew this act of sabotage took a special kind of skill that very few possessed. Even their own computer science specialist, Shane Menard, wasn’t capable of this magnitude of electronic destruction. No, it would have to be the act of someone who despised Israel, he told himself.

Frankly, the only person he could think of who might have the know-how was the young protégée in Seattle, Washington, Daniel Blumfeld. But that thought was absurd, because he was one of their own. He would have no reason to burn them. He was paid handsomely by Israel. So far, he had always done what was asked of him. Still, the young man might have an idea who could’ve done this.

For his own edification, using
Prophecy
Zimmerman checked on Blumfeld’s cell phone pings. He was relieved to see the device’s history pinged on the same
location in Seattle for the past couple days. It only showed a movement from the Orion Datacenter location to Seattle, where he must be in meetings. That was all ordinary and normal in the Mossad leader’s eyes. He felt guilty for even allowing himself a momentary look at Daniel as the possible saboteur.

The puzzling part was the whole Afghanistan plan of the demise of President Shazeb and the rescue by the Israeli military. The timing was too close to the sabotage. Was it coincidental? The Mossad leader didn’t think so. But what was the reason then? Walking through it logically, the result was that Israel’s communication was knocked out for a few days. Other satellites were this very minute being brought online to service the communication network. The rerouting was being programmed now but would take at least another day and a half.

So, what was so important that the communications needed to go dark for a couple days? Who needed a few days? That was easy. Rashid did. Zimmerman threw his notebook across the room.
Back to that man again,
he raged. It was like the young man was taunting him from afar. The Mossad leader was not about to take the blame for the sabotage by any of his underlings, particularly those he, personally, had brought into the agency. No. He would lay low and offer the usual sacrificial lamb: Iran or Palestine. He would bolster that with the theory that they were jealous of Israel’s recent high-profile rescue.

As he calmed down and returned to his desk, he decided that any investigation would be cursory at best. If it did relate to Rashid, then he didn’t want to know about it or, rather, he didn’t want the Israeli leadership to find out about it. Right now, they were more concerned about the incredible waste of money as a result of the satellite destruction.

Zimmerman was exhausted. His job was currently more stressful than he’d ever experienced. It just didn’t seem worth it any more. But he was at least ten years from retiring. Maybe he’d ask for a transfer to a country where nothing ever happened. He sighed and turned his attention to his monitor, where a list of invoices needed approval.

Fields was ecstatic when he heard the headlines upon waking. Now, he just hoped that Daniel’s path was untraceable. But knowing the brilliant computer science whiz as he did, he had faith their secret would be safe. He and Daniel had not spoken since the latter returned from Toronto. That meant there were no unforeseen issues, and their plans had gone off without a hitch.

After spending the night in Seattle and meeting with Mickey, Daniel had returned to the Orion datacenter plant. His drive back to the plant had been pleasurable. He replayed the events in Toronto in his mind and looked for any weaknesses or mistakes he might have made. None came to mind. In fact, the
scene where he returned the used car was the
coup de gras.
The guy was so focused on his phone call, that he took the keys and waved Daniel away. He didn’t even stop to ask where Daniel was going, offer him a ride or to summon a taxi, or watch as he walked the two blocks to the nearest bus stop.

Once he was home, just to be on the safe side, Daniel burned his fake passport and driver’s license. It had come in very handy, and he decided to get himself another set real soon. One must always have an extra set of IDs in the event of an emergency, he told himself. You never know when your real name might become obsolete … or a liability. He chuckled to himself.

The world was talking about the Israeli satellite having been sabotaged. Concerned countries were worried they were next. Business was good for computer science experts and consultants. Companies performed audits and checks of their networks to ensure there were no unauthorized eyes.

NSA Agent Frank Reynolds was curious about
Prophecy.
Would it weather the intense scrutiny of internal systems? He was both fearful and in awe of the seemingly invisible eyes. There was no change in his team’s ability to covertly monitor others via
Prophecy.
His team still wasn’t getting much from Israel. It was like it had put up a shield. At first Frank thought it was due to the destruction of the satellite, but as it continued, he realized
Prophecy
was being shut out of Israel’s intelligence data and communications.

Reynolds phoned Fields at his preferred time. It was noon in DC and early morning in Seattle. Most of the government minions were out and about midday. He could go anywhere or do anything and not be noticed. If he stayed at his desk, which was precisely where he was at this moment. Not only did he have privacy, but anyone passing by would think he was hard at work. In fact, he was hard at work. It just wasn’t the government’s business, he rationalized.

Fields answered on the first ring. He always knew when his frat buddy was calling. “Frank, how’s it going? Did you see the news?”

“Yes. It’s a bit coincidental, don’t you think?”

“How so?”

“Well, the timing of it, just a few days after the rescue. Don’t you think that’s odd?”

“Sorry, Frank, I deal in definites, not odds. That’s your field, so to speak.”

“Paul, I’m serious. What does Israel know that it doesn’t want the rest of the world to know? And who knows about it and didn’t like it?”

“Geez, Frank, you sound paranoid. Well, the only thing I can tell you is that I happen to know that Israel knows that Kendall and Rashid are alive. Are you ready for this?” He paused for effect. “Israel sent an anonymous email to General Omar, telling them exactly where they could find the pair.”

Frank Reynolds’ mind was shocked into silence. “But how? And why?”

“Rashid must have known something about Israel that it didn’t want made public. It must be in Israel’s best interest to see Rashid dead. Kendall’s probably nothing more than collateral damage.”

There was continued silence on the other end of the line. “Frank, are you there, buddy?”

Reynolds was getting an idea of what had transpired, and it was scaring the hell out of him. If all of this was true, then how come his friend, Paul Fields, knew all of this? Furthermore, Fields must also know about the destruction of the satellite. In fact, what part, if any, did he play in it? At this point, did Reynolds even want to know the truth? How had his friend and frat brother gone from being a CEO to playing God, using his incredibly illegal but brilliant
Prophecy?

“Frank, you’re scaring me! What’s going on?”

“Oh. Sorry, Paul. I’m just connecting the dots. If what you say is true, first, how do you know this?”

“Proph.
How else?”

“But I have
Prophecy
too. I don’t ever get anything from Israel any more. It all seems so gray and mundane. I feel like the blinds are down for me.”

“Well, you don’t have my, uh, expertise.”

“What the hell does that mean? Do you have some newer version that I don’t?”

“Not at all. But you, my good friend, don’t have my technical expert who, incidentally, developed the tool. He has had to do some maneuvering to get past the Mossad’s technical shields. He knows
Proph
backwards and forwards and can apparently modify it at will to blast through any new technical obstacle.”