Oliver nodded his head, but didn’t respond. After a while, Fullbright grunted, then turned his attention back to his desk, dismissing Tray with a wave of his finger.
Tray made his way back to his office, shut the door, sat down at his desk, and opened the red folder. The first page was a log which was used to keep track of everyone who had had access to the TOP SECRET message binder. He logged into the file by writing his name, the date, and the time that he had picked up the folder from his boss. Then he began to read.
The first message was from the Defense Intelligence Agency, a short advisory about some Ukrainian intelligence officer who, after many years of inactivity, had recently been sighted in Central America. It was speculated that he was now involved in the drug trade. Lt Col Tray scanned through the single page report. Not much of interest there. He moved on.
The next five messages were from various sources, two from the DIA, one from the CIA, and two from the National Reconnaissance Office. All five of the classified intelligence reports concerned the recent political tensions between Russia and the Ukraine, particularly the latest movement of Russian troops along the Ukrainian border. In the past few days, eleven Russian divisions had begun to pull back from the border, putting some distance between themselves and the Ukrainian armies that were massed in defensive positions along the common front. However, satellite imagery clearly showed a continued increase in activity of Fedotov’s short-range attack missiles. Tray mused over these reports for several minutes. So Fedotov was pulling some of his troops back. Could be good. Could be bad. It all depended on how things went. Either way, the impending war in the former Soviet Union was not his primary concern.
As Tray turned to the last message in the file, he couldn’t help but notice how thick it was. It must have been at least twenty pages, which was unusual, for normally the different agencies which passed classified intelligence information to one another tried to keep them very short. It wasn’t until Tray read the electronic return address at the top of the page that he realized the message had originated from the ICED detachment out at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. The message was addressed only to the ICED director, which was good. That would mean it would not yet have been disseminated out of the ICED agency. As Oliver Tray perused the lengthy report, he became even more relieved that no one outside of ICED had yet seen it.
He read the report several times, highlighting key points with a light yellow marker while jotting down more than two pages of questions and notes, then picked up his STEW III secure telephone to make a few calls.
The first person he contacted was Major Donnald, the author of the report. Tray knew him well enough to know that he didn’t have to doubt his work. Still, after getting Donnald on the phone and going through the usual exchange of brief pleasantries, he began to fire off a series of questions. How long had he been working on this project? What first had made him suspicious? Who were his sources? Had he been working alone? How far along did he think they might be in assembling the stolen equipment?
All through the grilling, Major Donnald remained cool. He was obviously very well prepared. As he answered his questions, Tray could hear the major sort through his notes. He remained extremely factual, answering Tray’s questions as directly as he could, all the while being careful not to interject his own feelings or personal opinions. He seemed to have done a lot of homework. Tray could just imagine. He tried to picture himself in Donnald’s shoes. If he had fired off such a message to his boss, he would have stayed up all night preparing for the arrows of doubt that he knew would soon be lobbed in his direction.
“What about documentation? Where do you stand? Have you got a reasonably good paper trail?” Oliver asked.
“Yes, I think we’ve got a good start,” Donnald replied. “I’ve got invoices and inventory logs for the missing computers, security police reports of the stolen software, as well as receipts from the contractor and statements from the guys out there in the state department who have been helping me track the destination of some of the illegally exported goods. It’s all here. But unfortunately, it still paints a very muddied picture.”
“One last question, Major Donnald.” Lt Colonel Tray was ready to wrap it up. “Why? Why could they possibly want all this equipment? What are they planning to do?”
A rather lengthy pause. “Sir, I have absolutely no idea. I don’t know. You tell me.”
“Yeah… I wish I could. But we better find out. Listen, what have you got planned for this afternoon? Any chance you could come out and meet with Colonel Fullbright? I’d really like you here. It would save us a lot of time.”
“My secretary has already made reservations. I can be at National by sixteen thirty. Can you have someone pick me up?”
“I’ll send someone over. And Major Donnald, bring the documentation. We’ll want to go through as much of it as we can.”
“It’s already packed. I’ll see you this afternoon.”
Oliver Tray hung up the phone and rubbed his eyes.
No wonder the director didn’t know what to think. This one was beyond even weird.
All those parts stolen from the B-1 simulator building up at Ellsworth. Whole racks of computers. And an entire bank of missing simulator software from the Rockwell facility out in California. And what about the 28,000 gigs of highly sophisticated computer programs that had been shipped out to Helsinki, all of it legal, but highly suspect?
But why? Who would want all that stuff? It had very little military or intelligence value. It just didn’t make sense. If Oliver Tray didn’t know any better, he would almost believe that someone was trying to build themselves a B-1.
That night, Ivan Morozov stalked into Andrei Liski’s office and slammed the door shut behind him. He was angry, and his mood showed on his face. Liski looked up from his reading, then leaned back in his chair and gestured for Morozov to sit. Morozov shook his head and remained standing.
“How is the simulator training going?” Liski asked. “Better than expected, I hope, given the deteriorating situation in Russia.”
Morozov grunted. “Some good. Some bad. But all in all it is coming along. We’re about where I thought we would be.”
“How long until you are ready? We have far less time than we originally planned for.”
Morozov didn’t reply. Liski returned his cold stare.
“Did you call me here to chat about our training, or have you got something else on your mind?” Morozov finally asked.
Liski reached down, opened the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a folded piece of paper. He tossed the paper across his desk with a flip of his wrist.
“Recognize this?” he asked dryly.
Morozov studied the paper and shrugged. “What is it?”
“It’s a phone number.”
“Okay,” Morozov replied. “So it’s a phone number.”
Liski leaned forward in his chair. “The night we brought Ammon in, he made two phone calls. One to his woman out in California. The other one to this number.”
A hint of fear flashed in Morozov’s eyes. “Whose number is it?” he demanded.
“I was hoping you could tell me,” Liski snapped. “It’s no longer a working number. Doesn’t have a country code. No area code that matches any within the United States. Nor any other nation, as far as we can tell. So you tell me. You’re the intel genius. Who did your boy call?”
Morozov didn’t answer.
“Ammon is looking like a total disaster!” Liski announced in a disgusted tone.
Morozov shot Liski a menacing glare. “How did you get this?” he demanded.
“It wasn’t hard. A little checking around with the Korea phone company was all it took.”