Teeth of the Tiger

the Special Forces, none of them complimentary and few of them accurate.

'There are some advantages to getting old,' the training officer replied. 'One of them is taking it easy on the knees.'

'Fine. What's today's lesson plan?' You lazy bastard, the captain didn't add. 'When are we getting those computers?'

'Pretty soon.'

'You said the encryption security is pretty good,' Dominic said. 'How good is 'pretty good'?'

'NSA can crack it, if they direct their mainframes to it for a week or so and brute-force it. They can crack anything, given the time to apply. Most commercial systems they can already break. They have an arrangement with most of the programmers,' he explained. 'And they play ball… in return for some NSA algorithms. Other countries could do it, too, but it requires a lot of expertise to understand cryptology fully, and few people have the resources or time to acquire it. So, a commercial program can make it hard, but not too hard if you have the source code. That's why our adversaries try to relay messages in face-to-face meetings, or use codes instead of ciphers, but since that is so time-inefficient they're gradually getting away from it. When they have time-urgent material to transfer, we can often crack it.'

'How many messages going across the 'Net?' Dominic asked.

Alexander let out a breath. 'That's the hard part. There're billions of them, and the programs we have to sweep them aren't good enough yet. Probably never will be. The trick is to ID the address of the target and key in on that. It takes time, but most bad guys are lazy about how they log on to the system — and it's hard to keep track of a bunch of different identities. These guys are not supermen, and they don't have microchips wired into their heads. So, when we get a computer belonging to a bad guy, the first thing we do is print up his address book. That's like striking gold. Even though they can sometimes transmit gibberish, which can cause Fort Meade to spend hours — even days — trying to crack something that isn't supposed to make any sense. The pros used to do that by sending names from the Riga phone book. It's gibberish in every language but Latvian. No, the biggest problem is linguists. We don't have enough Arab speakers. It's something they're working on out at Monterey, and at some universities. There are a lot of Arab college students on the payroll right now. Not at The Campus, though. The good news for us is that we get the translations from NSA. We don't need much in the way of linguistics.'

'So, we're not here to gather intelligence, are we?' Brian asked. Dominic had already figured that one out.

'No. What you can scare up, fine, we'll find a way to make use of it, but our job is to act upon intelligence, not to accumulate it.'

'Okay, so we're back to the original question,' Dominic observed. 'What the hell is the mission?'

'What do you think it is?' Alexander asked.

'I think it's something Mr. Hoover would not have been happy about.'

'Correct. He was a nasty son of a bitch, but he was a stickler for civil rights. We at The Campus are not.'

'Keep talking,' Brian suggested.

'Our job is to act upon intelligence information. To take decisive action.'

'Isn't the term for that 'executive action'?'

'Only in the movies,' Alexander replied.

'Why us?' Dominic asked.

'Look, the fact of the matter is that CIA is a government organization. A whole lot of chiefs and not enough Indians. How many government agencies encourage people to put their necks on the line?' he asked. 'Even if you do it successfully, the lawyers and accountants nibble you to death like ducks. So, if somebody needs to depart this mortal coil, the authorization has to come from up the line, up the chain of command. Gradually — well, not all that gradually — the decisions went to the Big Boss in the West Wing. And not many presidents want that sheet of paper to turn up in their personal archives, where some historian might find it and do an expose. So, we got away from that sort of thing.'

'And there are not many problems that can't be solved by a single.45 bullet at the right time and place,' Brian said like a good Marine.

Pete nodded again. 'Correct.'

'So, we are talking political assassination? That could be dangerous,' Dominic observed.

'No, that has too many political ramifications. That sort of thing hasn't happened in centuries, and not very often even then. However, there are people out there who rather urgently need to meet God. And sometimes, it's up to us to arrange the rendezvous.'

'Damn.' This was Dominic.

'Wait a minute. Who authorizes this?' Major Caruso asked.

'We do.'

'Not the President?'

A shake of the head. 'No. As I said before, there aren't too many Presidents with the stones to say yes to something like that. They worry too much about the newspapers.'

'But what about the law?' Special Agent Caruso asked, predictably.

'The law is, as I've heard one of you once say, so memorably, if you want to kick a tiger in his ass, you'd better have a plan for dealing with his teeth. You guys will be the teeth.'

'Just us?' Brian wondered.

'No, not just you, but what others there might or might not be, you do not need to know.'

'Shit…' Brian sat back in his chair.

'Who set this place — The Campus — up?'

'Somebody important. It's got deniable authorization. The Campus has no ties to the government at all. None,' Alexander emphasized.

'So, we'll be shooting people technically on our own?'

'Not much shooting. We have other methods. You will probably not be using firearms much. They're too hard to move around, with airports and all.'

'In the field naked?' Dominic asked. 'No cover at all?'

'You will have a good cover legend, but no diplomatic protection of any kind. You will live by your wits. No foreign intelligence service will have any way of finding you. The Campus does not exist. It's not on the federal budget, even the black part. So, nobody can trace any money to us. That's how it's done, of course. That's one of the ways we have of tracking people. Your cover will be as international businessmen, bankers and investment stuff. You'll be educated in all the terminology so that you can carry on a conversation on an airplane, for example. Such people don't talk much about what they're up to, to keep their business secrets close. So, if you're not overly talkative, it will not be seen as unusual.'

'Secret Agent Man…' Brian said quietly.

'We pick people who can think on their feet, who are self-starters, and who don't faint at the sight of blood. Both of you have killed people out in the real world. In both of your cases, you were faced with the unexpected, and both of you handled the situation efficiently. Neither of you had any regrets. That will be your job.'

'What about protection for us?' The FBI agent again.

'There's a get-out-of-jail-free card for both of you.'

'My ass,' Dominic said again. 'There isn't any such thing.'

'A signed presidential pardon,' Alexander clarified.

Fuck… Brian thought for a second. 'It was Uncle Jack, wasn't it?'

'I can't answer that, but if you wish you can see your pardons before you go into the field.' Alexander set down his coffee cup. 'Okay, gentlemen. You'll have a few days to think this one over, but you'll have to make your decisions. This is not a small thing I'm asking of you. It's not going to be a fun job, nor will it be easy or pleasant, but it will be a job which will serve the interests of your country. It's a dangerous world out there. Some people need to be dealt with directly.'

'And if we whack the wrong guy?'

'Dominic, there is that possibility, but, no matter who it is, I can promise you that you will not be asked to kill Mother Teresa's little brother. We're pretty careful about who we target. You'll know who it is, plus how and why we need to deal with him or her before we send you out.'