Myatlev stuck two of his right-hand fingers in the caviar and licked them, letting out a groan of satisfaction.
“On anything,” Myatlev replied. “Even if we don’t know on what, they will.”
Dimitrov swallowed a cracker dipped in Beluga, then said, “Now I am convinced you lost it. You’re not making any sense, my friend. I think the stress of life and of working with Abramovich has caused you some permanent brain damage,” he ended, half-jokingly, patting Myatlev on his shoulder.
“Nah… nothing like that,” Myatlev reassured him between bites of pate de foie gras washed down with another sip of vodka, “nothing like this, you’ll see. I’ll explain.”
“Huh… I’m curious to hear it,” Dimitrov said, then sat in a large leather armchair, stretching his legs, unbuttoning his jacket, and choosing a cigar.
“Just imagine we deploy a hundred assets, managed by ten handlers, on the American East Coast. We don’t know what to look for, but they don’t know that. So the handlers simply tell them to bring valuable information — the latest research, new technologies, and so on. We grab all that, we decrypt it, we study it.”
“Nah… that is ridiculous, Vitya.”
“I agree, some of the intel will be unusable crap, but some of it will be good. Good enough to let us know at least what’s out there worth looking for. Then we target our intelligence-gathering efforts, once we know what they’re doing.”
“So, you’re saying…”
“I’m saying Russia hasn’t conducted any decent intelligence work in the past two decades, Mishka, no offense intended. The Chinese are ahead of us in intelligence work, Mishka, the fucking Chinese! We have a huge gap. We don’t know who the players are any more and what they’re doing. This laser cannon thing caught us by complete surprise. And it was a pure shot in the dark.”
“Don’t tell me we don’t have lasers…” Dimitrov said, a hint of irritation coloring his voice.
“We do, but ours can’t be installed on battleships. First, we never thought of that, then second, we seem to be unable to make them smaller than a house.”
“Fuck…” Dimitrov took another drag from his cigar and blew the smoke out in small circles toward the open window.
“You see my point? The laser cannon intel was a shot in the dark. Smolin had no idea he had to ask for it. He just put the bait out for the asset, and the asset delivered one big motherfucking surprise.”
“How did he even find this asset?”
“He started from a list of interesting companies, from information that’s publicly available on the Internet. Now you see?”
“What?”
“What we could do with this type of approach, if we go after data and intelligence in a big way.”
Dimitrov nodded almost imperceptibly, then whistled quietly in admiration.
“You’re not crazy, my dear friend, not at all. Your diabolical genius still inhabits your attic,” Dimitrov said, tapping his own head with his finger. “But how are you planning to work through that massive amount of data?”
Myatlev smiled cryptically.
“How’s the construction going at your new military data center?”
“Almost done. They’re scheduled to bring in the equip — oh, no,” he stopped mid-sentence, “oh no, the Army needs that center, Vitya.”
“So you’ll build another one, Mishka, what’s the big deal? We need that center to build the biggest intelligence and security center in the world — the ISC. Ours. Just think what we can do with all that computing power.”
“We need that center, Vitya, for satellite operations, for military research, for new weapons.”
“And it will do all that, indirectly. Well, maybe not satellite operations, but everything else I think we can do.”
Dimitrov scratched his head, a doubtful look shading his eyes and wrinkling his forehead.
Myatlev didn’t let him think it for too long; he put a glass filled with vodka on ice in his hand, and toasted enthusiastically,
“To the ISC, ura! To Operation Leapfrog!” Myatlev cheered, baring his teeth in a wide smile filled with contagious confidence.
“To the ISC, to Leapfrog, na zdorovie!” Dimitrov replied, a little hesitant at first, then wholeheartedly.
The two men drank, then sighed loudly in the typical manner Russians express satisfaction when drinking to their hearts’ desire.
“How are you going to pay for this intelligence gathering, Vitya? It will cost a fortune. Intel is expensive, especially in America. People won’t betray their country for five bucks. You’ll need billions for such a bold plan.”
“I’m not going to spend a lot of money,” he said and winked. “I’m going to spend fear. And a little money too, but mostly fear. Just a little bit of carrot for our future assets, but mostly stick.”
Dimitrov looked him in the eye, surprised.
“That’s the value of big data,” Myatlev replied, but Dimitrov’s gaze remained puzzled.
Myatlev smiled a little arrogantly and whispered, “Trust me, everyone can be turned, everyone is gettable.”
…44
The four of them huddled closely together around Mason’s desk, a desk covered in paper and file folders unlike the typical organized workspace Mason liked to keep. Alex pushed the stack of files away from her a little, making room for the steaming cup of coffee she had brought in. Sam sat quietly, watching her get ready with a faint smile on his lips.
“Thank you for accommodating us this morning,” Alex said, “we appreciate it.”
“You’re welcome. It’s the least I can do,” Mason replied. “Wouldn’t a conference room work better, considering the size of my office?”
“For now, I think we’re good,” Jeremy replied.
“Great, let’s get started,” she said.
“I’ll start,” Jeremy said, “by giving you your temporary FBI credentials,” he said, handing Alex a badge. “Welcome to the FBI.”
“Thank you,” she replied, studying it on both sides. “I understand contractor, but why temporary?”
“You haven’t passed your polygraph yet. You’re scheduled for tomorrow morning; that was the earliest I could arrange.”
“All right,” she replied with a little hesitation and a frown. Sam smiled encouragingly, and she nodded an unspoken thank you to him.
“This credential clears you to gain access to all information regarding this case,” Jeremy continued, “so if you have questions, now’s the time to ask them.”
“I have plenty,” she said. “Mason, can you please walk me through the procedure one needs to follow to make a photocopy of a document — any document — inside Walcott corporate offices?”
Mason ran his hand over his shiny, clean-shaven scalp and thought for a second before answering.
“The protocol differs significantly between any document and a TOP SECRET file,” he said.
“Let’s focus on the TOP SECRET files, then,” Alex asked.
“Let’s start with gaining access to TOP SECRET files. One can only do that if one has access to the CDR, our Centralized Documents Repository. Even if someone has clearance to enter the CDR, they can only access or remove files they are cleared to work on. We have an internal system that keeps track of everyone’s projects, tasks, and workloads, and matches those with document inventory numbers. With me so far?” Mason asked.
“Yes,” Alex replied, while Sam and Jeremy nodded.
“So it’s safe to assume that our leak had access to the repository, otherwise he couldn’t have gained access to the source document in the first place,” Mason continued.