Bridger crossed his arms and studied his old third-world asset. He shook his head slowly. “So far he’s given me no reason to doubt him.”
Slippy set his screwdriver down gently and turned to face him. “Don’t tell me you’re going soft.”
Bridger scoffed. “Not hardly.” He pulled the chair out and sat beside him, lowering his voice. “After Diego hung us out to dry, I intended to punch his time card for him.” He leaned back and chewed at his inner cheek. “I heard through the grapevine that the Policía Nacional de Colombia had grabbed him. Since he was our internal CI, they thought that he was truly part of the cartel and…” He trailed off, his mind taking him to dark places.
Slippy stood slowly from his chair. “Wait, so…THE Colombian Nationals tagged and bagged him and he…”
“Didn’t sell us out. He maintained his cover.” Bridger sighed as he continued to stare at the man on the other side of the camp.
“I was going to say that he survived interrogation.” Slippy slowly sat back down. “So, he’s a bona fide good guy.”
Bridger nodded. “Otherwise he’d be pushing up daisies.”
“So the whole ‘forgive and forget’ thing?”
Bridger shrugged. “Was already forgiven and forgotten. I just wanted a ride from the airport and knew that he had set up shop close by.”
Slippy slowly began to smile. “And you wanted an extra trigger on this op.”
Bridger shrugged again. “It couldn’t hurt.” He abruptly stood and pushed the chair back. “Besides, with Mauk acting as overwatch, you’re gonna need somebody to cover your six while you’re driving the hornets.”
Slippy groaned and turned back to his station. “That’s a big if I can get all of this coordinated.”
Bridger’s face twisted in confusion again. “Why’d you say ‘if?’”
Slippy leaned back and stretched his neck. “I’m going to have to run two computers. I thought that I could control all of them from one, but there are too many and the processing power just isn’t there to handle forty drones.”
“I thought they were AI assisted.”
“They are, but for that we’d have to upload the target ID package. Facial recognition, telemetry, all of that. There’s enough internal storage on a drone to do that, but the only IDs we have are our own. The IFF will protect our side, but I can’t find a work-around to just set them loose and sic’ em on the other heat signatures.” He sighed and rubbed at his eyes. “If it were that simple, then we could just release them in the wild and walk away. They’d eventually clean them all out.”
Bridger groaned. “You have to drive each of them individually?”
Slippy shrugged. “Not…exactly.” He sighed and turned the computer screen to him. “I’m gonna set this up like a system test. A trial run, okay?” He tapped at the keys then leaned back. “The drones will search and destroy using IR readings. If there’s somebody out there with body temperature, they’ll see it, they’ll approach it in stealth mode and they’ll fire a suppressed round into their skull.” He tapped the silhouette of a human. “Or chest, if the head isn’t clear.”
“So if they’re wearing body armor…” Bridger trailed off.
Slippy nodded. “Exactly. They’ll shoot the chest then look for the next target. A subsonic nine millimeter slug won’t penetrate.”
“A standard nine mil won’t penetrate,” Bridger groaned. “So what’s the plan?”
“I have to read the target’s reaction as each drone strikes. If they go for a head shot, I can release them to the next heat signature.”
“What if they’re wearing a helmet?”
“It will show on the playback. The drones are programmed to identify something like that and aim for the base of the skull or the neck.” He grimaced. “Not exactly an instant kill, but it should be effective enough to do the job.”
“Unless they miss the spine, then the target can pop off a few rounds, alerting the others.”
Slippy nodded. “That’s also a possibility.” He groaned as he turned back to the screen. “We’ve never used these. They’re untested in a real life scenario, and there are just too many variables for me to trust them to a single computer.”
“So, you’re going to be pretty deep in the rabbit hole during this phase.”
Slippy actually snorted a laugh. “That’s putting it mildly.” He glanced around then whispered, “I’m thinking seriously of popping a few Ritalin before this shit starts…just don’t tell my boss. He’s a hard ass. Especially when it comes to performance enhancing drugs.”
Bridger frowned at him as he slowly stood again. “I’ll keep your secret this time.” He leaned closer and growled low, “But let’s not make a habit of this.”
“Me?” Slippy popped off as he reached for a Red Bull. “Never.”
Langley Virginia
Director Jameson stood directly behind the technician as the man typed commands into his console. “Let’s narrow the view.”
The technician typed more information in and the image on the screen zoomed in on the general area. “How tight, sir?”
“I want a ten kilometer diameter. Can we detect heat signatures at that distance?”
The tech shook his head as he typed again. “I can’t be certain, sir. I’m sure we could, but the ambient temperature for that area will make it hard to…” He paused then leaned to the side so the man could have a better view. “Apparently we can.”
Jameson leaned closer and stared at the screen. “I don’t suppose there’s any way to filter out the wildlife?”
“We need at least an eight degree difference in core body temperature for the filters to be effective, sir.” He typed in the variants and waited as the screen reset. “It didn’t clean up much, Director. I’m sorry.”
Jameson sighed as he stared at the image. “What is this empty space?” He made a circle with his fingers between the heat signatures around the outer perimeter and the heavier concentrations closer to the compound.
The tech shrugged. “A buffer zone maybe?” He rested his chin on his hand and leaned closer, studying
