Critical Exposure

“Maybe and maybe not. Actually he knew me back when I used the John Phoenix cover. When I talked to him after he left the message, I managed to convince him that was a cover name I used back then and that Stone’s my real name.”

“What happens if you ever have to change it up again?” Grimaldi asked.

“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Bolan said. “But even if I do, Oz won’t ask any questions. He’s got too much style for that and he understands that what I do for the country may not always fall within strict military guidelines.”

“Oz sounds like a good friend to have,” Grimaldi remarked.

“Like another good friend we know?” Bolan said with a smile.

Grimaldi started to conjure a reply but was interrupted by the opening of a door and the entrance of a black man who by Grimaldi’s estimates couldn’t have been any less than six-foot-six. Nearly as many medals donned the breast pocket of his Class A uniform coat as they did Bolan’s—probably a few more—with the most striking difference being that Roland Osborne bore the deep blue colors of the U.S. Air Force. Aside from that, he was clean-shaved with close-cropped curly black hair that was gray at the temples. He was handsome, distinguished and obviously quite pleased to see Bolan when he first laid eyes on him.

“As I live and breathe!” he bellowed, his voice deep and resonant. He stuck out a hand that Bolan rose and took immediately. “Colonel, it is damn fine to see you!”

“Same here, Oz,” Bolan replied easily. He nodded at Grimaldi who now stood, and said, “Meet my...adjutant, Jack Gordon.”

“Gordon?” Osborne said, offering Grimaldi a warm and dry handshake.

Grimaldi nodded and, noticing the almost mischievous twinkle in the colonel’s eye, found himself liking the guy right off. He had a vibe that few seemed to possess.

“Pleased, sir,” Grimaldi said, attempting to retain some official and military bearing. Osborne may not have been blind to Bolan’s real gig, but that didn’t mean Grimaldi saw any reason to go out of his way and advertise the fact. To anybody.

“No worries, Captain Gordon, just call me Oz and let’s skip all the stiff formality,” Osborne said.

He gestured for them to be seated and then said to Grimaldi, “I don’t believe we’ve ever met. Whenever this man pays a call he’s usually alone.”

“I only joined his staff a few years ago,” Grimaldi replied simply.

Osborne nodded, obviously content with that, and then put his attention on Bolan. “So I got your message that you were flying in. I figured since you didn’t say more than that this wasn’t a social visit.”

“Afraid not,” Bolan said. “I’m here to follow up on that information you passed along to me, Oz.”

“The signals thing?” Osborne raised his eyebrows. “Yeah, it’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen. We still can’t make heads or tails of how the signals got redirected and decoded but we’re narrowing it down, closing in on the source of the hack into our systems.”

“I’m not completely up to speed on these signals you’re talking about,” Bolan interjected. “Care to elaborate?”

“Well, you already know part of it, I would assume—at least given your background,” Osborne said. “In typical standard operations, non-classified and general orders or other things, we pipe communications through the normal channels. Emails, phone calls and whatnot. But each and every military operation deemed classified requires very specific protocols be used when transmitting orders.”

Bolan partially directed his voice at Grimaldi as he said, “You’re talking about all orders for classified missions, regardless of where they come from, have to go through NORAD.”

“Correct. We then verify the authenticity of the orders before they’re sent on to whatever might be the receiving unit.”

Grimaldi shook his head. “I’m sorry, sir, but you lost me. What do you mean by ‘receiving unit’? You’re talking a military unit?”

Osborne gave him a sharp nod. “You betcher ass, Captain. Those transmissions are coded and, regardless of origin, we have to verify the authenticity of the orders before going out. We don’t want somebody, for example, to put out an Executive Order to launch nuclear missiles from a submarine halfway across the Pacific unless we know damn sure the orders were genuine.”

Grimaldi emitted a low whistle as he looked at Bolan. “Even I didn’t know that.”

Bolan nodded. “There can’t be any mistakes when you’re talking about coordinating military operations at any given point.”

“One miscommunication,” Osborne added, “and you could spark the next world war or cause a nuclear response from a country where none was intended. To say nothing of removing America’s advantage in a first-strike scenario.”

“Okay, Oz,” Bolan said. “That’s fair enough, but how would someone intercept these transmissions? And even if they did, how would they have the know-how to decode them?”

“I can’t answer that yet. But what I can tell you is that we found some hidden code that we can’t explain. When we decompiled and refactored it we realized it was an inside job—done so well that the source is indeterminate.”

“So how do you expect to find whoever intercepted the transmissions?” Bolan asked.

“The program was designed to route the transmissions through a very specific network of internal servers. Now the addresses were masked and we’ve hit the additional snag that the code is self-regressing.”

“Meaning?” Grimaldi asked with a furrowed brow.

It was Bolan who replied. “Meaning it was designed to self-destruct if discovered.”

“Bingo,” Osborne replied.

“How much more time to do you think you’re going to need to find this place?” Bolan asked.

“That’s the tough part to estimate,” Osborne said.

“Best guess?”

“Another day, maybe two. After that it won’t matter if we don’t have any answers because as you’ve pointed out, the code will have fractured to such a degree it’ll be useless as tits on a bull.”

“Fair enough,” Bolan said. “But what if I told you I know somebody who might be able to help you speed up the process?”

“I’m open to suggestions,” Osborne said with splayed hands. “At this point I see we got nothing to lose trying everything.”

“Glad to hear it,” Bolan replied. “Because I have just the right guy for the job.”

CHAPTER THREE (#u22368837-47a4-5368-b2a9-758ba726b1b0)

“Talk to me, Bear,” Mack Bolan said.

“We were able to pick apart the code,” Kurtzman replied. “Akira managed to find the obligatory self-destruct codes and shut them down, so we had enough transitory information left behind. After that it became a cakewalk.”

“Akira” was Akira Tokaido, one of the best computer hackers in the world, and a valued member of Aaron Kurtzman’s cyber team.

“So you know where the original intercept program was sourced?”

“To within a grid about a quarter-mile square.” A pause ensued and then he continued. “The transmissions were sourced from a wireless, high-frequency satellite tower in the central Rockies. I’m uploading the exact coordinates via secure link to Jack’s navigation system. He can then set it from there and put you down on almost a dime.”

“Unless it’s heavily wooded,” Bolan remarked.

“I made sure they had rappelling gear aboard, boss,” Grimaldi chimed in. He’d been listening to the conversation through his own headset.

“Looks like we’re set then,” Bolan told Kurtzman. “Thanks again for the assist, Bear. I’ll be in touch when we know something more.”

Bolan signed off.