One hour before an explosion over Washington, D.C. Casablanca, West Africa—a secret location
“Nice and quiet,” Betty said to herself, twirling her pen as she stared at her computer screen. It was hot, she was sweating, and flies were buzzing around her. An overhead fan did nothing but push the hot air around the rented room.
A male voice came over the small speakers, whispering, “We are in position.”
Betty eyed the screen confirming everything was in place, then responded, “Commence.”
After a momentary silence, the voice came back, “Ready to transmit?”
“Send,” she said, hitting the Enter key. Her breathing slowed as line after line of garbled text rapidly filled her screen. As each new line appeared, she carefully watched, looking for one that stood out. The text was in code. Not just any code. It was the Vatican’s secret communication system, and she had just broken in.
Betty watched intently with her finger poised over the Enter key like a gunslinger on the trigger. Ever since CIA agent Jess Contreras’ true colors had emerged as a double agent, Betty had been obsessively digging and searching for a way into the ultra-secret Vatican mainframe to find out exactly who she was.
The highly trained MI-6 team had spent the last few days carefully and methodically breaking into the Vatican network, and at this moment— albeit illegally—they were in. They were part of a team that Betty knew personally and trusted. The American and British governments had been infiltrated. As to how high and extensive the infiltration, she did not know yet. Until she had that answer, it wasn’t safe for her to come out of hiding—at least not yet.
Her finger began to tremble, for there was no way to determine how fast the Vatican electronic security team would discover the break. For now, she and her team were victorious, but ready to break the connection instantly if the intrusion was detected.
After several more tense seconds without blinking, Betty’s aching, tired eyes reached the limits of dryness in the hot and humid room. Her eyelids began to drop to remoisten her eyes when suddenly she saw the code. Her pupils constricted, and like a reflex, her finger hit the Enter key. Without looking down, she lifted her cramped finger, confirming the line she was looking for was captured.
It was!
Now the specifically designed decryption software went to work. From this point on, her system would absorb the secrets of the Vatican.
Line after line of code was being copied to her software. After several more seconds, she decided she wasn’t going to push her luck by hitting the decipher icon, permanently capturing and storing the information. Doing it too quickly could reveal their presence. If everything went as planned, the Vatican would only assume that the system was being accessed from inside by their own people.
Several more seconds went by when a line of text caught Betty’s eye. She had pre-programmed the software to filter out and alert her if two important names came up: Alex Pike and Jess Contreras. She couldn’t believe how quickly the filtering worked and immediately highlighted the name and the section it was in. She then copied and pasted into a message icon and hit the Send key. Not sure of exactly what it was, but she sent it anyway; the message would be forwarded to the CIA director and then to Ed. He’ll figure it out, she thought to herself, smiling.
With her eyes still riveted to the screen, she took a deep breath, and with her slightly shaking hand reached for her cup of now-cold tea. She lifted the cup, took a sip, and sat back in her chair. The spring-loaded chair had extended to its limits when suddenly the word ‘DAGGER’ flashed in blinking red letters from the center of the screen. She dropped her tea, bouncing the chair forward and almost flipping it over. The cup smashed onto the floor as Betty frantically lunged toward the keyboard, hammering with her fingers in hopes of hitting the Escape key. The cold tea now soaked her ankles as she held her breath. The Vatican now knew she was there and automatically sent a treacherous virus to destroy her files, her software, and eventually herself. It was like a retaliatory blitz on London after Berlin was bombed. The Vatican security team intended to completely destroy the intruder.
Betty didn’t blink as the decryption software did its job. After a few seconds, it was clear that she successfully disconnected before the DAGGER hit her system. Or, did she? She leaned into her speaker and instructed, “Get out now; they know you’re there.”
The male voice responded, “Yes ma’am,” and the line went dead.
Betty glanced at the time. The Vatican security response team would know her location and her goal to protect herself and the team from their intrusion was now the top priority. She survived one horrible attack and was absolutely not going to give the Brotherhood, or the Vatican, another shot at her. She reached down, pulled the plugs, and slowly closed her small but powerful briefcase computer. If what she just stole from the Vatican gave her the answers to what she was searching for, then she would contact Ed and re-join the fight. She grabbed her coat, slipped on her sunglasses and opened the door. As she did, she glanced in the dirty wall mirror by the door. A stranger looked back. Gone was the well-dressed woman in classic black. Another looked back through dark glasses framed in pink, glittering with rhinestones, a silly pink coral scarf wrapped around her head and tied in back à la Betty Grable and the Forties. A deep pink straw hat topped all. She wore a wildly colorful blouse cut rather low, showing aging skin that had never seen the sun. This clearly was a woman who wanted to be noticed, not a woman running for her life. It was less than a five-minute walk to the port where her ferry now awaited. She took one last look around, and began her escape.