Two questions governed his thoughts, and the first was answered immediately. On the screen in his mind he entered and sent the words: Amsterdam Schiphol METAR.
The response was almost immediate. It felt like a benediction.
METAR EHAM: 11240755Z 06008 1BR 2OVC 10/08 Q1009
METAR was the international format for aviation weather — as a helicopter crew member, DeBolt knew how to decipher it. Cool, wet, misty, fifty degrees — it was a lousy day in Amsterdam. Far more relevant — his private telecom network seemed operable in Europe. There had been no way to know if META would reach this far, so DeBolt was immensely relieved. He was sure the system had been birthed, at some level, inside the United States Department of Defense. But that gave no guarantee it would work worldwide. Then again, if META truly was some type of military program, wouldn’t that be the point? He imagined a unit of men like Delta, all able to access unlimited data from any place in the world. How lethal a force multiplier would that be?
DeBolt’s musings were cut short when the airplane reached the terminal. There his second concern rose to the forefront. Would Ronald Anderson’s identity get him through Dutch immigration? That question ran headlong to an answer. He was one of the first passengers to disembark, and found no line whatsoever at the customs and immigration queues — another perk of business class — where a stern-faced blond man took his passport.
The irony of that moment was not lost on DeBolt. He had been born in Colorado, yet his parents were both Dutch, as was his surname. Standing at the immigration booth as Ronald Anderson, DeBolt looked at a man who one generation ago would have been his countryman, the same light hair and blue eyes, the same open facial features. There was a fleeting moment of panic that one Dutchman might recognize another, some primal ethnic connection. Then the passport came back through the window and DeBolt heard, “Have a nice stay in Holland, Mr. Anderson.”
It was over that quickly. With no luggage, DeBolt walked outside to the curb and ran headlong into the cacophony of cars and busses that ringed every big airport. There he stood and tried to work out his next problem: how best to cover the last five hundred miles to Vienna.
Two hours after DeBolt reached Amsterdam, Lund arrived in Vienna on the nonstop United flight from Dulles. She was arrested immediately.
They were waiting in the gate area, two uniformed policemen and a plainclothes officer with a photograph in his hand.
“Shannon Lund?” the man with the photo asked as she emerged from the jetway amid a single-file crowd.
It was an ominous introduction, and one that left no room for denial. “Yes.”
“I am Oberkommissar Dieter Strauss of the Bundespolizei. You must come with us.” The man’s accent was hard on the consonants. As a law enforcement officer, Lund realized he was not making a request.
“What is this about?” she asked.
“The United States has formally requested your detention. It relates to a criminal matter, but I can say no more here.”
Lund wasn’t surprised. Not really. Wheeley, or someone higher in the chain, had flagged her passport. Not soon enough to keep her from leaving the United States, but a ten-hour flight had allowed them to play catch-up. She was now a demonstrated flight risk, which wouldn’t make her situation back home any easier. Worst of all — it brought her efforts to help Trey to a skidding halt.
She said the only thing that came to mind. “I’d like to talk to someone from the embassy.”
The policeman grinned with one side of his mouth. “And someone from the embassy wants very much to talk to you. You will meet them at Bundespolizei headquarters.”
“I checked a bag.”
“One of my men is retrieving it now. Oh, and I must ask you for your mobile.” He held out an empty hand.
Reluctantly, Lund reached into her purse and handed over her Samsung. The inspector seemed to study the device, then found the correct button to turn it off.
“Anything else?” she said with undisguised annoyance — even if she would have handled things precisely as Oberkommissar Strauss had if their places were reversed.
“No,” said the policeman.
“Okay, then let’s get on with it.”
Everyone played their roles with staid civility. There were no cuffs, and they guided Lund to an unmarked government car which, twenty minutes later, delivered them to the side entrance of a building marked simply POLIZEI.
She was escorted through a long hall, rose three floors in an elevator, to be finally deposited in a very secure-looking interrogation room with a cipher lock on the door. Lund was given a water bottle, denied a cigarette, and asked very politely to wait.
As if she had a choice.
46
With the bulk of his journey behind him, DeBolt decided a train was the least-risk option for the remainder. Rail to Vienna would take twelve hours, even on high-speed ICE trains, but now that he was established in the E.U., it seemed the most likely way to travel without further testing the passport of Ronald Anderson.
He exchanged dollars for euros at a station currency kiosk. He had enjoyed the business class transatlantic flight, but with limited cash going forward, DeBolt opted for an economy seat on the train. The first leg to Cologne was relatively short, a two-hour blur on a high-speed route. He spent an hour at the station in Cologne where he exchanged the remainder of his dollars for euros, and took an espresso and a sweet roll at a track-side teashop. He also continued to test META’s network.
Since arriving in Europe he’d had no trouble getting a connection using his internal wiring. As far as he knew, the only way tell if things were working was to make a request. He found himself wishing he had a status bar above his screen to display the current signal strength. If I ever meet the designer, he thought, maybe I’ll mention it.
Even with a connection, DeBolt was unsure what META could do on this side of the Atlantic. Were there differences, limitations? Slower response times? He began with the facial-recognition application, and was mildly disappointed by the results — roughly half of his inputs came back with positive IDs, many of these proving to be Americans. He guessed that certain European countries, and probably much of the rest of the world, didn’t register driver’s license or passport photos in whatever database he was accessing. Or perhaps META was restricted from breaching the servers of particular countries.
He tried for identities on a number of people who he thought might be recent immigrants from the Middle East and Africa — DeBolt knew Europe was awash in refugees, and train stations were ground zero. Not a single one registered. The reason seemed apparent. Without a known image on file for comparison, it didn’t matter how good your correlation software was. DeBolt also noted that many responses seemed to take longer, perhaps because his information had to funnel through fiber-optic cables miles under the Atlantic Ocean.
He noticed a security camera near the teashop entrance, and wondered if he might be able to get a feed, much as he’d done at the embezzler’s house outside Calais. Camera networks, from what he remembered, were everywhere in Europe, and the idea of accessing them seemed unthinkable. He experimented with a few commands, but nothing seemed to work. As he did, DeBolt watched a constant stream of people come and go through the doorway, and he imagined what it would be like to track them through the indifferent eyes of so many black-and-white feeds. Everyone going about their business, not realizing they were being watched, or perhaps not caring. If he could gain that power? It would be intoxicating and voyeuristic, like being night watchman to the world.