The Identity Mine

XXVII

Ethan felt the wheels of the Boeing C–40B Clipper aircraft thump down on the runway at Andrews, the enormous airbase flashing by as the aircraft’s brakes and reverse thrusters were applied.

A squadron used for transport by members of the administration, the 89th Airlift Wing included the President’s famous USAF VC–25, a converted Boeing 747 known as Air Force One when the President was aboard. Ethan was sat in a plush leather chair which he had extended fully, allowing him some precious sleep after the flight from the USS Harry S. Truman to Saudi Arabia. There, they had boarded the US Navy’s Clipper and flown to Ramstein in Germany for a refuel before then continuing on across the Atlantic to Washington DC.

Ethan unstrapped himself from the comfortable seat as Lopez yawned and stretched nearby, glancing briefly out the window.

‘Are we there yet?’

Ethan got up as he grabbed his jacket and back pack. ‘Let’s just hope we’re here in time.’

A Navy Lieutenant hurried back to join them as the aircraft taxied in, his fresh faced appearance belying his experience and authority.

‘A transport is awaiting you and your contact at the Defense Intelligence Agency is also ready to brief you. You’ll be taken directly to the headquarters of the National Security Agency.’

A glossy black limousine rolled out across the servicing pan and slid in alongside them as they descended the steps from the huge aircraft, the lieutenant opening the door for them to climb aboard. Inside, Jarvis awaited them.

‘Welcome back,’ he said. ‘We don’t have much time so I’ll be brief. There’s been a major breakthrough and now we’re looking at an imminent terrorist attack.’

‘The ceremony on the South Lawn tomorrow,’ Ethan confirmed as the limousine moved off. ‘It’s the perfect target for Abrahem Nassir, and the Presidents of two countries he may have a grievance against will be there.’

‘We won’t have long to locate and apprehend Abrahem,’ Jarvis agreed, ‘so we’ve been given Stellar Security Clearance courtesy of the administration and the Joint Chiefs of Staff. We’re heading to the NSA, so you’ll need to sign these.’

Ethan looked down at a pair of non — disclosure agreements as Jarvis handed each of them a pen.

‘What have they got in there?’ Lopez asked.

‘Like I said, you’ll have to see that to believe it,’ Jarvis replied. ‘I could barely believe it myself, and you won’t be seeing anything until you’ve signed those NDAs.’

Ethan and Lopez signed the agreements, and Jarvis remained silent during the short journey from Joint Base Andrews to the NSA Headquarters.

Ethan looked up at the NSA’s glossy black building, a gigantic rectangle of mirrored glass that reflected a shadowy version of the world beyond, the blue skies and white clouds muted and warped. Ethan knew that behind that mirrored glass were layers of copper and more glass to make sure that signals stayed within the agency, protecting it against electronic eves — dropping.

‘Keep your mouths shut and your eyes straight ahead,’ Jarvis said to them as the vehicle in which they were travelling pulled into the NSA’s massive parking lots and began processing through the security check points. ‘You’re cleared to be here, but only because of the seriousness of the situation and the president’s personal say so.’

Ethan expected Lopez to utter some quip, but she too seemed subdued as the vehicle closed in on the massive building.

The National Security Agency had been established by President Truman in 1952, its purpose simple and direct; protect the United States of America against the intelligence gathering forces of other nations, and simultaneously gather intelligence on said nations. Within that remit and with ever increasing levels of sophistication, the NSA had used the rapidly evolving technology known as SIGINT — Signals Intelligence — to pursue its purpose, that of absolute knowledge and absolute control of intelligence across the globe. Although many people around the world had heard of other agencies such as the FBI and the CIA, and despite the fact that the CIA was indeed the senior agency, it remained that few people knew of the existence of the NSA nor of the fact that all other agencies in the United States of America relied upon it for both Signals Intelligence and cryptographic analysis.

Working alongside the United Kingdom’s GCHQ, along with similar such agencies in Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the pooling of resources between these agencies formed the backbone of Echelon, a much discussed and equally veiled communications analysis network that enveloped the world’s telecommunications. The satellites, optical fibre taps, Internet monitoring and cryptographic analysis resources of these combined networks made it possible, though not easy, to monitor the communications of almost any person on the face of the planet.

‘Do we know if Abrahem Nassir is in the country?’ Lopez asked as the vehicle eased through the security checkpoints.

‘No,’ Jarvis replied. ‘There’s no sign of him entering the US through a customs airport or seaport, which means that if he is here he can only have accessed the country via a private aircraft. We’ve been monitoring all flights into the continental United States from Africa, but he could have routed through Europe too.’

‘He would have had to jump before landing to avoid customs airports,’ Ethan pointed out, ‘if an aircraft had been used. That’s a tall order if you haven’t done it before.’

‘He must have sympathizers on our soil,’ Lopez added. ‘That could explain how this was all arranged. We know that there are US citizens supporting terrorist activities all the time, albeit in very small numbers. He must have moved from ally to ally across the globe to end up here.’

‘Transport will most likely have been provided,’ Jarvis agreed, ‘along with other support to get him toward whatever destination he has in mind. Your questioning of the militants in Somalia revealed only that he was likely to be travelling here. Considering what I hear the SEALS put them through, I think it’s fair to say that if they had known anything more they would have said so.’

‘They were just pawns in Abrahem’s big game,’ Ethan said. ‘We’ve got to assume that his target is the Trans Pacific Trade ceremony at the White House, for which he could have dozens of implanted serving and former military personnel all available as potential assassins. Hell, much of the police force is made up of former soldiers. We could prevent one attack only for Abrahem to initiate another instead so he’s our only viable target. We’ve got to track this guy down or whatever’s coming will be like another Pearl Harbor, another nine — eleven.’

‘I know,’ Jarvis said, ‘which is why you’re here and with special clearance into the NSA Headquarters. The CIA and FBI are in the loop but they’re far behind the curve on this one, so you two have point right now. Whatever we find out here will guide what we do next on the ground. I only hope it’s enough.’

Ethan looked at his surroundings through the vehicle’s tinted windows.

‘So this is where Echelon is based,’ he said as the vehicle descended into a below ground — level parking lot.

‘Echelon was the old version of our SIGINT capability,’ Jarvis replied as the vehicle whispered to a stop in the underground lot and he opened his door. ‘What we have now is known as PRISM.’

Ethan followed Jarvis with Lopez alongside him as they walked at a brisk pace through the building, the seriousness of the situation giving the old man’s pace new vigour as they descended via an elevator into what Ethan realized was a subterranean section completely concealed from the outside world.

‘You need to play catch up here on what’s happened and what the NSA’s involvement is,’ Jarvis said as they descended in the elevator. ‘Echelon, a clandestine global surveillance and intelligence gathering initiative between many countries allied to the United States, was replaced with PRISM in 2007. The NSA uses PRISM to collect Internet communications from major US Internet companies and is operated under the supervision of the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.’

‘Is this the program that was leaked a few years back?’

‘By Edward Snowden,’ Jarvis confirmed, ‘who is, depending on your outlook, a courageous patriot or an insane traitor. Either way, PRISM’s existence went public and revealed not just the extent of the surveillance gathering but also a financial arrangement between the NSA’s Special Source Operations and PRISM partners worth millions of dollars.’

‘So what’s the connection between this PRISM and our search for Abrahem?’ Ethan asked.

‘It’s not Abrahem that’s the link,’ Jarvis replied. ‘It’s China. PRISM is responsible for more than ninety percent of all the NSA’s Internet traffic acquired using FISA section 702 authority. The Edward Snowden leaks also exposed the existence of MYSTIC, a voice interception program used here at the NSA to record every single phone call made in a targeted country for thirty days, and that intelligence analyzed for potential targets of interest that may threaten US security. With the spotlight on these programs and the media focusing on them, the real conspiracy has been missed entirely.’

‘What conspiracy?’ Lopez asked. ‘Do you mean Majestic Twelve?’

‘For once,’ Jarvis replied, ‘MJ–12 are as behind the curve as we are. It’s this way.’

Jarvis led them down a corridor of pristine white panels illuminated from behind and in deep contrast to the impenetrable blackness of the building’s exterior.

‘We’re being scanned for recording devices,’ Jarvis said as they walked. ‘The scanners are implanted behind the walls.’

As they reached the end of the corridor a door opened and two armed soldiers stood to attention before checking their security passes against a log and then waving them through.

Jarvis led them through a doorway and into a large Watch Room that looked not dissimilar to the ones Ethan had seen at the Defense Intelligence Agency. Large screens ringed the walls at the front of the Watch Room in the manner of a space agency’s control room, and rows of desks with operatives seated behind them monitored events across the world.

But this time, there was something odd about the images on the screens, the pictures indistinct, slightly blurred.

‘The news feeds are out of focus,’ Lopez said.

Jarvis shook his head. ‘Those are not news feeds.’

Jarvis walked to one corner of the room and then turned to face them, speaking softly so as not to disturb the thirty or so operatives at work behind their desks.

‘Welcome to The Identity Mine,’ he said simply.

‘The what?’

Jarvis gestured to the Watch Room around them. ‘This room is used specifically to monitor the activities of thirty or so of the most wanted people on the planet,’ he explained. ‘Their activities are observed in a way that no other country on Earth has ever been able to do before so that the NSA is able to predict when and where they’re going to strike next. This program is in its infancy, just a couple of years old and so clandestine that even Edward Snowden wouldn’t have been able to get near it.’

Ethan frowned and looked at the screens. Several of them showed slightly blurred images of people talking to the camera and responses coming back from somebody out of sight. Others showed the view through a car windscreen as it drove along a highway, yet another the interior of a busy shopping mall. Several of the screens were almost black but filled with bizarre little points of light swimming and zipping about on them.

‘I don’t get it,’ he admitted finally. ‘What are they actually watching here?’

Jarvis smiled, clearly enjoying himself once again, standing in the center of something so secret that barely a handful of people in the world knew about it.

‘They’re not watching the criminals,’ Jarvis said. ‘They’re watching what the criminals are seeing.’

Lopez stared at the screens for a moment longer and then her jaw dropped. ‘This is what the criminals are doing, right now?’

‘Right this very instant,’ Jarvis confirmed, gesturing once more to the screen. ‘Welcome to the future of intelligence gathering, where the criminal leads law enforcement directly to the scene of their next crime. You’re not seeing through the eyes of a camera, and not even precisely through the eyes of the person in question. You’re seeing what their brains are seeing, literally as it happens.’

Ethan blinked and almost missed a breath as he tried to digest what Jarvis was saying.

‘Their brains? How is that even possible?’

Jarvis smiled, clearly as amazed as Ethan at the technology before them.

‘You’re watching the brain waves created by what they’re seeing converted into moving images here in the Watch Room. Effectively, you’re seeing their thoughts.’