Monkh stopped for the second time ten miles outside Asheville. He still had three hours until his flight departed, and not wanting to spend any more time than necessary at the airport, he turned into a minor scenic overlook.
He stood up the Kawasaki in an empty parking area. An informal trail led up the nearest hill, and he followed it to the crest and then over the top. On the far side he paused, removed his helmet, and rubbed a hand over his mid-length black hair. He’d been wearing the helmet for much of the day, and it felt good to be free of it. After relieving himself on a bush, he sat on a warm rock, cracked open a water bottle, and took a long draw.
The Blue Ridge Mountains spanned out before him, their signature hue evident in the late afternoon sun. He again removed the sat-phone from his jacket, powered it up, and saw a good signal. A second message from his employer bubbled to the screen. He had let the first go unanswered, making no attempt to call back.
This message, however, got his attention.
It wasn’t a message in the usual sense; there were no words or emojis. Only a fifteen-digit alphanumeric string, special characters included. It was a code that would mean nothing to anyone else in the world. To Monkh, however, it was a five-alarm fire.
Ignoring an electric jolt in his spine, he quickly switched to his burner phone and called up the app that linked to his crypto wallet. Thirty seconds later, his worst fears were realized.
The account had been zeroed.
He closed his eyes tightly, embracing the darkness for a time. When he opened them, the truth on the screen hadn’t changed. Soon, however, the shock waned, and he began to think more clearly. His employer was only making a point, emphasizing who was in charge. Probably piqued that he hadn’t responded to the earlier message.
He stood and began pacing back and forth, loose stones crunching under his boots. He wondered how they had done it. He’d employed a secondary authentication app, created a complex private key, and always used clean devices. Still, they had bettered him.
He supposed he shouldn’t be surprised. His employer had virtually limitless assets, and would spare nothing to control every aspect of the strike. Monkh had been paid one hundred percent in advance, a highly unusual arrangement, although not out of line given the risks he was taking. He had accepted the most difficult contract on earth: to take out the president of the United States. The success of his strike still hung in the balance, but he’d done precisely what they’d asked him to do, including cleaning up the loose ends last night. There was still a follow-on assignment, but that was child’s play compared to eliminating the leader of the free world.
Monkh regarded the encrypted phone, turning it in his hand. He turned off the burner, then initiated a call to the vaulted number on the satellite handset. It was answered after two rings. This was a message in itself—he typically had to wait for a callback.
“Next time don’t take so long to reply,” said the distant voice. The words were electronically garbled, a method to deny voice identification. Monkh had been hired for this job through the only channel he trusted, a dark web connection with multiple cutouts. As a rule, he didn’t need to know the identity of his employers. All they needed to know about him was his reputation for success. Still, there were always clues. The choice of targets generally pointed one in the right direction. As did the prescribed time and manner of elimination. In this case, there was also the garbled voice on the phone. Despite the electronics, there were always tells. American English, no decipherable accent. A decided air of superiority.
“Next time don’t steal my money,” Monkh replied.
“Yesterday’s job is incomplete. She’s alive.”
If the man had been in front of him, Monkh might have shot him. Almost singlehandedly, he had downed Marine One and then eliminated the only two witnesses who could compromise the operation. The execution of the plan, which was not of his creation, had been flawless. Then, according to the news reports, some do-good idiot at the park had hauled Cleveland out of the sinking wreckage.
“I carried out your plan to the letter,” he argued. “Any shortcomings were no fault of mine.”
“Your protest is noted. In any event, it’s still possible you have succeeded. The president may succumb to her injuries.”
“Is that what they are saying on the news?”
A humorless snort. “News in America is worthless. It’s little more than entertainment, media companies profiting through fearmongering. My information is factual, and sourced from the highest level.”
Monkh’s phrasing had been deliberate, and he deconstructed the reply. In the end, he decided not to fence. “What do you want?”
“More conclusive results on your next mission. And after that, I may need you to return to Washington.”
“Washington? For what?”
“A follow-up could be necessary.”
“A follow-up? You can’t be serious. Her protection would be impossible to breach.”
“You overestimate. Difficult, but not impossible. If it comes to that, I’ll find a way to get you in.”
Monkh hesitated. “And my money?”
“Half will be returned tomorrow, deposited right where you left it. If I were you, I would make arrangements, move it somewhere more secure. You’ll get the rest when the job is done.”
“I want all of it up front.”
“What you want is immaterial.”
“And if I decline?”
“Do I really have to say it? You are talented … but hardly unique. If I chose to press the matter, you would be hunted to the ends of the earth.”
Monkh fell very still. He tried to think of a retort, something clever and defiant. When nothing came to mind, he simply ended the call. His fingers vised around the handset. He briefly wondered if hanging up would be viewed as insolence or defeat. Probably both, he imagined.
He powered down the phone and put it back in his pocket. Monkh wasn’t surprised. Not really. Irrespective of who his employer was—and he had narrowed that to a short list—they were both in very deep water. Which meant they were bonded by a necessity of mutual success. Or, barring that, mutually assured destruction.
He started back toward the parking area, no attention whatsoever paid to the stunning vista. It occurred to Monkh that his original contract was morphing, and he wondered if that had been the idea all along. Three possibilities came to mind. First was that his employer had no intention of taking a second shot at the president, and that he considered Monkh a loose end to be eliminated when he returned. The second option was a variation of the first: that his employer would send him into a suicide follow-up, eliminating Elayne Cleveland and at the same time severing the last link to his own complicity. Yet there was a third possibility. Could there truly be a high-level insider? Someone who could pave the way for a second shot at Elayne Cleveland? The drone attack had involved some proprietary intelligence, but at base it was a simple scheme that applied a new weapon against known defenses. The shell game with helicopters, in place for years, hadn’t kept up with the times. Yet a second shot at the president would require true insider knowledge. And if Monkh received that kind of intel? Then the list of possibilities as to who he might be working for got very short indeed.
There was, of course, one alternative to all of that. Monkh could simply walk away. He was an expert at disappearing, and he had enough money to lay low for years. But would his ambition, his drive to perfection permit it? His hypercompetitive personality had thrived in the gaming world. Later he had enthralled commanders in the People’s Liberation Army and various intelligence agencies, and since going private Monkh could count scores of satisfied clients. After all that, could he sit and do nothing for years?
It seemed tantamount to defeat.
Minutes later Monkh was on the Kawasaki, idling toward the road. He paused at the shoulder to check for traffic. The big bike stood balanced between his legs, the quiet thrum of its engine poised. He was faced with a classically dichotomous question: a digital choice between two outcomes. Cut free and disappear with nothing. Or double down at far greater risk. In a gaming tournament there would have been no question whatsoever. Risk brought reward. Yet in the real world, risk could prove painful. Even terminal.
Monkh looked left, then right. He gave the throttle a turn and the big bike shot into the road.
Goode announced she was ready, and the others semi-circled behind her laptop.
She began with a condensed history, everything the CIA had learned about The Trident since March. Slaton himself had acquired some of the information, having tracked down a middleman who confirmed there were three principals in the group. All were wealthy Chinese, and two had once run large corporations—one a supplier of defense electronics, the other a weapons manufacturer—while the third had an academic background with research and development ties to the defense industry. All of them had departed lucrative, high-level positions for a far more shadowed world. Unfortunately, while the middleman Slaton had tracked down knew that much, he claimed to not know their names. He described them only as men who “provide advanced hardware and mission objectives, then pay others to throw the spears.” The middleman might have told Slaton more had he not been killed by an assassin. Since then, the trail had gone cold.
Until now.
Goode came to the new intel. “We’ve finally got a name—it came from a source in Beijing.”
“How reliable is this source?” Slaton asked.
Sorensen replied, “We began recruiting him many years ago, while he was working on his doctorate at MIT. There’s a popular cliché relating to spying in academia—it basically suggests that Chinese graduate students come to America under the guise of getting an education, then do nothing but steal vital research. That does happen, but it can also work in reverse. These students see the freedoms we enjoy. They make friends, have lovers. The agency approaches some of them, gives them a means of contact. When they go back to China to work on cutting edge projects, a few turn out to be quite useful.”
Goode picked up. “As it relates to The Trident, we quietly put out word last month that we were trying to identify former defense industry executives who had overseen development of the weapons used in these recent attacks. We narrowed it down to pulsed lasers and hypersonic missiles, so it was a small net to cast. This source told us the CEO of China Precision Electronics left his post suddenly last year. Once we had the name, dots began connecting.”
Goode referenced the laptop, and extensive files appeared on the man in question: his academic and corporate history, personal information, even pattern of life research.
“Looks like you’ve been busy,” Slaton said.
Sorensen replied, “Nothing focuses a search like an assassination attempt on the president.”
Goode opened the first file, and said, “His name is Yao Jing…”