well as gaps that were currently not covered due to darkness obscuring the video feed. Jesse was currently out with Khalid and security, taking pictures of the potential camera locations, leaving Khalid' s computer open for us to data mine.
In truth, getting in there had been easier than getting approval for the operational act from the Oversight Council. Those hand.wringers seemed to think I was asking to assassinate the president of Yemen. Eventually, they'd relented.
I saw Jesse and Khalid on one of our temporary "test" cam.eras, which were actually security for tonight's operation. They were entering a stairwell on the first floor, which meant that they were headed back.
"You got about five minutes."
Retro said nothing, simply watched the screen. I turned back to the camera, seeing the group disappear from view. I heard "Yes!" and turned around.
Retro was stroking the keyboard. "I got it. But everything's in Arabic. I was hoping for at least the file names to be English." He disengaged his little brute-force cracking device and plugged in a cloning gadget to the USB port.
"What's that mean for time?" I asked
"Well, I can't do the entire hard drive. I'm scanning for encrypted files. It should also clone the system bios, capturing any passwords that have been saved."
He kept stroking the keyboard, grunting every once in a while. He said, "I got about forty encrypted files. Transferring now."
I heard distant footsteps in the hallway and looked at a mirror I had positioned in the crook of the door. I saw Jesse, which meant Khalid was on the way.
"Shut it down. Khalid' s thirty seconds out. We'll have to take what we have."
"Almost done."
The footsteps grew louder.
"Shut it down. They're outside the door."
"Hang on."
"Damn it, Retro."
I saw a shadow and blocked the doorway, smiling.
"We're almost done with the network assessment," I told them. "How did the stroll go?" Jesse picked up on the tension and said, "Fine. You want to come see the biggest problem area?"
"Yeah. As long as we're here."
Khalid said, "No, no. My wife has prepared dinner. Another time." He pushed past me into his office.
Chapter 10
I felt the adrenaline spike, flooding through my veins, and wait.ed to hear Khalid ask what the hell Retro was doing. I glanced at Jesse and said, "Block the door."
I entered the office to find Retro packing his bags and Khalid shutting down his computer. Nothing amiss at all. Retro glanced at me with a grin and said, "We going to follow you, Muhammad? I'm looking forward to some home cooking."
* * *
An hour and a half later, we were all stuffed and going into food comas. Khalid's wife had been the epitome of hospitality, and, truthfully, Khalid himself was growing on me. It probably wasn't the correct thing to think given my line of work, but I was glad this mission profile explicitly prevented us from harming him, as we didn't want to spike al-Qaeda about their compromise.
His wife brought out tea, and I felt my phone vibrate. I risked a surreptitious glance and saw a text that the GPS tracker was in place.
Retro had purchased international smart phones for all of us and had embedded an application that tracked each one. I'd given instructions to Kranz, Reaper, and Bull to wait until we were stationary, then to drive to our location and emplace a civilian tracker on Khalid's vehicle. It wouldn't transmit, but it would record every bit of movement that Khalid made for three weeks, including changes in elevation and temperature, and it was seamlessly integrated with Google Earth. The only bad thing was we would need to recover it to get the data, but when we did, we'd know everywhere he had gone. And would have our pat.tern of life with little work.
It was another Retro purchase, and it made me wonder what the hell the CIA was keeping hidden from us. If this could be bought open source, they had to have something that would do exponentially more.
I relaxed after reading the text,
In truth, getting in there had been easier than getting approval for the operational act from the Oversight Council. Those hand.wringers seemed to think I was asking to assassinate the president of Yemen. Eventually, they'd relented.
I saw Jesse and Khalid on one of our temporary "test" cam.eras, which were actually security for tonight's operation. They were entering a stairwell on the first floor, which meant that they were headed back.
"You got about five minutes."
Retro said nothing, simply watched the screen. I turned back to the camera, seeing the group disappear from view. I heard "Yes!" and turned around.
Retro was stroking the keyboard. "I got it. But everything's in Arabic. I was hoping for at least the file names to be English." He disengaged his little brute-force cracking device and plugged in a cloning gadget to the USB port.
"What's that mean for time?" I asked
"Well, I can't do the entire hard drive. I'm scanning for encrypted files. It should also clone the system bios, capturing any passwords that have been saved."
He kept stroking the keyboard, grunting every once in a while. He said, "I got about forty encrypted files. Transferring now."
I heard distant footsteps in the hallway and looked at a mirror I had positioned in the crook of the door. I saw Jesse, which meant Khalid was on the way.
"Shut it down. Khalid' s thirty seconds out. We'll have to take what we have."
"Almost done."
The footsteps grew louder.
"Shut it down. They're outside the door."
"Hang on."
"Damn it, Retro."
I saw a shadow and blocked the doorway, smiling.
"We're almost done with the network assessment," I told them. "How did the stroll go?" Jesse picked up on the tension and said, "Fine. You want to come see the biggest problem area?"
"Yeah. As long as we're here."
Khalid said, "No, no. My wife has prepared dinner. Another time." He pushed past me into his office.
Chapter 10
I felt the adrenaline spike, flooding through my veins, and wait.ed to hear Khalid ask what the hell Retro was doing. I glanced at Jesse and said, "Block the door."
I entered the office to find Retro packing his bags and Khalid shutting down his computer. Nothing amiss at all. Retro glanced at me with a grin and said, "We going to follow you, Muhammad? I'm looking forward to some home cooking."
* * *
An hour and a half later, we were all stuffed and going into food comas. Khalid's wife had been the epitome of hospitality, and, truthfully, Khalid himself was growing on me. It probably wasn't the correct thing to think given my line of work, but I was glad this mission profile explicitly prevented us from harming him, as we didn't want to spike al-Qaeda about their compromise.
His wife brought out tea, and I felt my phone vibrate. I risked a surreptitious glance and saw a text that the GPS tracker was in place.
Retro had purchased international smart phones for all of us and had embedded an application that tracked each one. I'd given instructions to Kranz, Reaper, and Bull to wait until we were stationary, then to drive to our location and emplace a civilian tracker on Khalid's vehicle. It wouldn't transmit, but it would record every bit of movement that Khalid made for three weeks, including changes in elevation and temperature, and it was seamlessly integrated with Google Earth. The only bad thing was we would need to recover it to get the data, but when we did, we'd know everywhere he had gone. And would have our pat.tern of life with little work.
It was another Retro purchase, and it made me wonder what the hell the CIA was keeping hidden from us. If this could be bought open source, they had to have something that would do exponentially more.
I relaxed after reading the text,
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