(Fixed the dates and a few typos)
October 27, 2020
Matt Blair swerved from behind the bus to his normal spot next to the sidewalk. The bus exhaust faded with the warmth. The traffic rushed by as he dropped his bike into neutral and stood up just enough to slip his massive right hand glove under him and sit down. His hand slid free and unzipped the heavy coat pocket to retrieve his badge and clip it to his left glove then slide back into his glove. All within 30 seconds then he shifted to first gear and swerved into the first opening and leaned into the turn to the security gate. The old '88 CB 750 was a massive steel creation and once going, was a joy to ride, but sometimes made the stop and go of city driving a workout.
The armed guard nodded at the badge, but they never stopped him or asked him to remove his helmet. Parking was easy to find in the Reston undisclosed branch of the CIA. He kept his helmet on until he was almost at the sliding doors, then removed it so the ice wind only burned his face a moment. His riding sleeve cut most the burn though.
“Why?” The guard at the desk asked.
“No snow on the road,” Matt replied. “Uses a lot less gas and I can use sidewalks,” he added with a wink and tapped his badge against the reader to get through the turnstile.
“Man, I wouldn't ride one of those things around here, even in the summer.”
Matt pressed the button for the elevators, avoiding the steps since his knees wouldn't de-thaw for another 20 minutes. “You know, the new natural gas buses have much cooler exhaust than the older ones.”
“I heard they are pretty warm in side,” the guard chuckled and then turned back to the monitors when the elevator opened and Matt entered.
It was only a moment before the doors opened to the second floor. Matt's vault was towards the end of the long hallway. “How many times today?” he asked himself as he walked. The combination lock on the thick, sound-proof door was old. It usually took 4 tries before the temperamental lock opened. He had to spin it 3 full turns to the left, but those turns had to start on the last number of the combination. Otherwise, it was four turns, maybe. Then each number had to stop on the exact tick of the number, to the millimeter. With his fingers still somewhat numb from the half-hour freezing ride, the shaking never helped.
Five tries this morning, damn. He'd get an email from his chief in 20 minutes to justify the potential security break. Damn.
The lights in the room popped on as the door opened and he saw his other 3 office mates, or was it 2 now, weren't in yet. He hit the button on his computer to start it, then went to start the coffee. All the security programs, monitoring tasks and daily updates would take five-ten minutes to load, so he'd have a hot cup of coffee by the time he could log in.
While waiting, he plugged his cell phone in and turned off the signal. No signals got through in the vault, so no sense wasting battery. He saw that his voicemail light wasn't blinking so he started getting undressed. The heavy boots, snow pants and long johns all fit in the bottom drawer and his back pack held a fresh change of jeans and polo shirt and it only took him a minute to dress. He'd only been caught in his underwear one time, but that was enough to make him dress faster. His dress-sneakers were in another drawer and he usually didn't put those on until after the coffee had kicked his bowels into action. Lastly, he placed his Glock in a locked drawer after removing the clip and checking the chamber.
Finally his screen prompted for the username and password, which led into another two minutes of loading profiles and adding icons to his desktop. Every reboot essentially rebuilt his desktop, so he could log into any computer on the network and have access to his information.
There was the email from his chief, so he pasted in his normal reply, “Vault lock doesn't work, needs replaced. I raised a ticket 3 months ago.”
Armed with coffee, solitude and warmed joints, Matt started the real work. Yesterday he's been read into new compartments and had access to the data systems he'd been requesting for two months.
At 44, he was part of the “new breed” and used computers as well as field work to track down the threats. His primary love was using computers, but he stayed updated and certified in the field work requirements.
Staring at the SQL screen, he let his mind roam and sipped coffee.
There were three Russian agents he was tracking. Facial recognition had them flying into New York over the past seven months under different names, but no arrests were made and he couldn't access the domestic tracking data, that was under NSA purview. Today, he was able to open his query to other regions. The first query was broad, all know assets from North Korea, Iran, China that flew into New York on the same dates as his three agents.
The coffee was working and it was time to put on his shoes and walk to the other end of the hall. He locked his computer and opened the vault door to walk down the beige hall and outdated carpet. Afterwards, he stopped by his chief's office. The door was open, but he still knocked before walking in.
“Morning, John,” he said as he walked in.
“Matt, don't worry about the email, it's just procedure,” John said, just glancing up from his computer. Then he looked back. “Matt, we've talked about the dress code.”
“No management is here. They're all over at Langley. This happens every four years. They are scrambling to keep their jobs and appointments. They'll be walking a tight-wire until mid-November when the results are announced. I have a suit and tie in my vault, so I can do a quick change if I need to go upstairs.”
“You're pushing it. Like everyone else, we're just trying to keep our head down and get the jobs done. Don't rock the boat. That's all I'm telling you.”
“Got it boss. I'll change when I get back. Ok?”
John sighed and massaged the bridge of his nose. “Sorry, everyone's stressed and stretched. What do you need?”
“Nothing. I've got my access. I'll coordinate with with Tim Aster at NSA if I need to, but I'm thinking that won't be for another couple of days at the earliest.”
“Keep me posted. Run this strict, Matt. With the turmoil upstairs, they're going to pick everything apart. Right now, they're looking for scapegoats. Depending on who wins, there's going to be heads rolling. If you see anything political, run it by me first.”
“You betcha, boss. Anything I can do to help?”
“Don't cause waves for the next couple of weeks.”
October 28, 2020.
Matt exited the metro at Gaithersburg and began walking to the Lakeforest Mall. He could have taken one of the taxis, but it wasn't that cold for October and he needed the exercise in the winter. This year he'd sworn not to fall into the seasonal weight gain. His riding sleeve covered his mouth and nose and most people were wearing face masks as he walked to the mall. The restaurants were only doing take out or delivery for another month, so there wasn't a lot of foot traffic on the street. All in all, he started to enjoy his break from the office and the sun seemed a little brighter.
The food court was closed for seating, and the lines we almost non-existent, but he grabbed a coffee from Auntie Ann's and found a bench near the food court to wait.
“Thanks for the excuse to get away,” Tim said, sitting next to him with his own coffee. His black over coat covered his suit. “What's up?”
“Ceiling,” Matt said and nodded up, the joke slipping through his internal censors. “What's your load look like?”
“Busy, but nothing critical. We're in the normal pre-election holding pattern. Normal chatter out of Russia. Nothing unexpected.”
One of the reasons he got along with Tim was they both spoke Russian. Matt had studied it college and worked as an interpreted for a few years, but switched to computers and eventually to the CIA with his background. Tim was one of the best linguists in the country and spoke fluent Russian, Ukrainian and a few other languages. Matt's Russian had slipped over the years, but he could still carry on a conversation and vodka definitely help his fluency.
“I might need your help. I've got some leads that are outside.” Both agents kept the conversation general and didn't mention names. The area wasn't secure so the paranoia was part of the job.
“Sure. Normal stuff, I assume.”
“Yep. I got three you've met. I'm checking on other teams, and it looks promising.”
Tim nodded and he sipped his coffee. “Same positions? Or different?”
Matt and Tim had met five years ago playing pickup hockey at a rink in Reston. As their friendship had grown, they'd run into each other in briefings. Matt covered Russian activity outside the US and Tim covered activity inside the US. The more they'd worked together, they developed their own codes and used hockey as part of it. Same positions meant Russians, different meant other countries.
“Different positions. Two of them can play forward and defense, but only in a pinch.” Different countries, but at least two had affiliations with Russia.
“That's going to make a crowded locker room. Not everyone's going to be on the same page.”
“Exactly, I don't think they'll be a threat to our team, but we might be able to recruit a couple to round out our roster. You in for the game this weekend? It's late, 10:30 I think.”
“Yep, I'll be there. You've got net?”
“Yep. No drinking before this game, but I'm buying rounds after.” Matt laughed. They did have a game on Saturday, in the Over 40 league. Tim was a solid defense, but usually drank one too many IPAs before the game. Matt had given up pre-game drinks since they slowed his eye-hand coordination.
Tim got up and tossed his empty cup in the trash can. “Saturday then. I might crash at your place.”
“Always welcome, bud.” Matt stayed seated and continued to drink his coffee. “Gimme a call if you need anything.”
“You gotta love technology,” Gary Sidowski said, surveying the room from his glass office. There were 20 laptops, all with fiber optic connections. There were also three green screen rooms with the software and scenes to seem to broadcast from anywhere in America. Right now, one of his agents was standing in one, Zoom broadcasting to a small group of Christians from different locations. He was explaining how the current President, Clarence Williams, had fought non-stop to protect Christian values and the main stream media had subverted all the good he'd done. The stream had been going on for twenty minutes and currently had thirty-one viewers. But tomorrow, there would be double that for the replay and his live broadcasts would grow more and more.
The room behind him was full of the other team members. They were discussing the false stories and facts. Last he heard, they were going to find a box of “thrown out” mail-in ballots, filled in for the incumbent president. That was the one of the first plots that had struck gold.
“You're not making enough progress,” Lev said, still standing, looking at what his money had bought. “We need more.” He glanced at the overhead screen summarizing the statistics. “Thirty-one people are not going to win us this election. It has to be in the hundreds of thousands.”
“You are looking at one broadcast, from today on a new story about destroyed mail-in ballots. It's lunch time. We had all three booths running this morning and a total of four hundred viewers.” Gary said, sitting straighter.
“Four Hundred? That's nothing!”
“Four hundred is amazing. What you are not seeing is that those four hundred sent a total of over four thousand emails to to their friends and contacts with links to the videos. Those four thousand will send another ten thousand and by tomorrow, we'll have links shared on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and SnapChat. You start with a few and then they spread your message. If we send out thousands emails, they will all be deleted, but when the emails and links come from their friends or people they know, they will read them and click the links. Most won't bite, but we're after the zealots, the ones that will clog the internet with our stories. Once enough are posted, they become truth.” Gary stood up and walked from behind his desk.
“You know the media stories about the mail-in ballots thrown out in South Carolina? They started with one photo of, I think, two boxes. Only two mail-in ballots were visible, but we did a good forgery and the photo was just clear enough to see what we wanted. Now, it's believed by hundreds of thousands and each new one we post, those are automatically believed as a fact with no basis in fact. That is how you win the war now.”
“How long until we have actionable people?” Lev asked, still wanting something concrete.
“From today? Unknown. But in total, we have 43,289 that will organize or attend protests. Thousands of them have been at opposition events and started counter-rallies. We were instrumental in starting the riots at the George Floyd protests in New York and other cities and you've seen how effective that has been. See, it only takes one person to strike the spark and others will follow. Now the violence is blamed on BLM and ANTIFA.”
Lev stopped his pacing, for the first time realizing what he's unleashed.
“It's not the numbers, Lev,” Gary says quietly, his arms wide, embracing the room and all it encompasses. “It's the belief. And we manufacture belief.”
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