“Yeah.”
“You’re serious?”
“
Morris winced. On the monitor, three Atlantic City police officers had just cut down a terrorist who’d ignored repeated commands to drop his weapon.
“What… what did you find?” Morris asked, turning away from the bloody sight on the screen.
“We don’t exactly know,” Tony replied. “There’s some kind of laboratory or drug factory or something inside the Crampton Street warehouse, which is supposed to be abandoned. A garage door opened up and Judith Foy shot a couple of surveillance photos. But we have no way to analyze the images on this end.”
“Can you send them along? Or is Deputy Director Foy still worried about leaks?”
Tony sighed. “I’ve convinced her the leaks have been plugged, but we don’t have a PDA. I can send the images to you through my cell phone, but they’re bound to lose some resolution.”
“I know. Wish our technology was better. Maybe in a few years—”
“Morris! We don’t have a few years.”
“We can enhance the digital images on this end, Tony, make your pictures as good as new. Just send them along.”
O’Brian gave Tony a phone number to use for the data dump. After he hung up, Morris faced Peter Randall.
“We’ve got some intelligence coming in. It will be dumped in cache twenty-two. Digital images. I’m rather swamped here. Can you analyze them?”
“Sure, I’ll be glad to, Mr. O’Brian,” Randall replied.
“I’ll do the work at Security Station Two, if you don’t mind. Less distractions…”
“Good lad,” Morris murmured, his eyes drifting back to the live feed of the firefight in Atlantic City. But as soon as Peter Randall was gone, Morris reached for the phone.
“A name,” Jack Bauer demanded.
“It will do you… no good…” The Albino’s voice was weak. He let out a moan of agony, blood streaking his pale face. “You can’t stop… what’s about to happen.”
“A
The Albino cried out, perspiration beading his forehead.
“A name.” Jack probed even deeper, hitting bone.
“NOW!”
“Soren Ungar!” the Albino blurted out. “His company, Ungar, Geneva, LLC, is the real owner of Rogan Pharmaceuticals.”
“And it was Rogan that provided the drugs that drove the men and women of Kurmastan mad?” Jack hissed, twisting the blade.
“Yes!” the Albino shouted.
Jack yanked the knife back, dropped it on the hardwood floor. “Why?” he asked.
The Albino shook his head.
“Talk!”
The Albino was breathing hard. “Before I tell you,” he gasped, “I want a pardon. Signed by your President. Forgiving all my past crimes.”
Looming over the man, Jack shook his head.
“You’re an
“You can fix this!” the Albino insisted.
“I can’t, and I won’t,” Jack replied. “No bargains.”
To Jack’s surprise, the Albino actually shrugged under his bonds.
“As you Americans are fond of saying, you can’t fault a man for trying,” he said. A strange smile lifted his lips, and then he bit down hard. Jack heard a crunch, and Erno Tobias choked. When he opened his mouth, black blood poured from his throat.
“No!” Jack cried.
His body jerking spasmodically, the Albino’s eyes rolled up in his head, then he fell forward, hanging loosely from the chair. Jack felt for a pulse, but found nothing. He yanked back the man’s head, reached into his mouth to find the poison capsule. Jack was stunned.
Jack quickly discovered that the toxic chemical had been stored inside a hollow tooth. The second the poison hit the man’s system, he was dead.
Jack stumbled back, dropped into a leather chair. He still needed more information, but now at least he had a name.
Jack rose and crossed to Erno Tobias’s computer. He’d already forwarded the information stored there to Morris O’Brian. Now he began searching the files himself, looking for some clue to what was really happening,
After entering the security code that allowed him access to cache twenty-two, Peter Randall opened the file Tony Almeida had forwarded to CTU. It contained three digital images, which needed little enhancement. Two of the pictures clearly showed Ibrahim Noor’s secret bio-weapons laboratory. The black Hummer rolling into the garage obscured much of the scene in the third picture.
The Ohio lab was also housed inside a brick warehouse, the surveillance photos were taken at night, and with a little Photoshop tinkering, Randall even placed the black Hummer into the third image.
The photos would not stand up to close scrutiny, but Randall gambled they wouldn’t have to.
When Randall was finished, he deleted the original photos that Foy and Almeida had taken, replacing them with the pictures he’d selected. Then he printed them out.
A final check of the hard copies revealed no obvious flaws that might give his ploy away.
Satisfied with a job well done, Randall shut down the security console and swung around in his office chair — to find the interim director and two security men standing over him.
“D-Director Henderson, c-can I help you—”
The tranquilizer dart hit Randall in the throat, and he gagged once. The drug took immediate effect, and he slipped out of the chair and hit the floor.
“Put this son of a bitch in a detention cell and prep him for interrogation,” Henderson said.
The security men each grabbed an arm and roughly hauled the unconscious man toward the elevator.
Henderson faced Morris O’Brian, who’d been lurking in the hallway.
“Good job, O’Brian,” Henderson said. “But how did you know Peter Randall was a mole?”
Morris shrugged. “I was suspicious of him already, but the real trap was the cache number I gave him. Access to cache twenty-two is only permitted to personnel one level above Randall’s security clearance. Randall was so overconfident, he didn’t think to ask me for the password to cover his buttocks. That’s when I knew
