Tysons Corner, Virginia
Don Riley adjusted the tray of pastries on the credenza and lifted the pump handle on the coffeepot. Everything had to be perfect for this visit.
His phone buzzed, an incoming text from the security officer on the front desk. Mattias is in the building.
Don wiped his hands on his trousers and smoothed the front of his suit coat. He took a deep, cleansing breath. Emerging Threats was about to give their first major presentation.
For Don, everything was on the line. A private briefing for the CIA’s ops and resources director was a rare event. Mattias controlled the finances, equipment, and personnel in the Directorate of Operations.
While not technically part of Don’s official chain of command, the head of the Operations and Resources staff carried enormous sway within the CIA power structure. His visit meant Don’s group was on someone’s radar.
In the never-ending budget battles that went on in the bureaucracy of every government agency, results mattered—and Dylan Mattias was a man who demanded results. If Mattias liked what he heard, Don’s stock would rise.
If not, well, there were two sides to every coin.
The door to the conference room snapped open and Mattias entered. His dark hair was swept straight back from his forehead, with just enough hair product to hold it in place, but not enough to make him look smarmy. The flash of gray at his temples hinted that his age was north of forty, even if his youthful face said midthirties.
He was fit and moved with energy, his tailored Italian suit clinging to him like a second skin. Like most case officers, he acted with a quiet confidence that came from a lifetime of persuading people to do things they didn’t want to do. He crossed the room to greet Don, hand outstretched, with a wide smile.
“Don,” he said, “it’s been a long time. How’ve you been way out here in the sticks?”
Don returned the smile, doing his best to mirror the other man’s warmth and confidence—even though he felt neither. “Fine, Dylan. The new digs are great.”
Mattias’s attention to detail was legendary. Don could see that the man was assessing everything. The quality of the security protocols, the behind-target staffing levels, probably even the quality of the coffee and Don’s damp handshake.
“We brought in a couple things for breakfast—”
“Already ate,” Mattias cut him off. “Let’s get down to it.”
Don threw a questioning glance at the door. “Did you bring any staffers?”
Mattias shook his head and sat down, pulling a slim notebook from his jacket pocket and a gold Cross pen. “This is just you and me today, Don. The director asked me to take stock of the situation and make some recommendations.”
Recommendations. The word hit home like a punch in the stomach. Emerging Threats had been active for only a few months and now Mattias was here to make “recommendations.”
“Right.” Don kept the frozen smile in place. “Let me pull in the team.”
Mattias pointed at the seat across from him. “I thought maybe you and I could chat for a few moments first.”
Don did his best to look nonchalant, but inside his stomach was gushing acid. He drew the chair out, feeling his armpits slicken with new sweat. “Sure thing. What’d you have in mind?”
Mattias made a show of opening his notebook and dating a fresh page. He laid the pen across the open page. “This is a great opportunity for you, Don. For us. We’re at a crossroads. Politically speaking, I mean. No one in the administration wants to get involved in another overseas conflict.”
Mattias gave a what-can-you-do shrug. “‘Emerging threats’ means different things to different people, so I want to be clear. Your job is to stop these issues before they emerge into the public awareness. This Mahdi character needs to be contained.”
“I’ve got my best people on it,” Don said. “Anything we can do to put this thing to bed quickly, these three are the ones who will get it done.”
Mattias tapped his pen on his open notebook. “These are the same three who were involved in the North Korea incident, correct?”
“The very same. If there’s something there, they’ll find it.” Don paused. “That said, we are very early in this process. ‘Emerging threats’ by definition means that we don’t have the full picture, so drawing conclusions from any analysis is not only difficult, but dangerous.”
Mattias squinted across the table. “We get paid to make the hard choices, Don. The president is crystal clear on this point: He wants to play offense. If we have anything that smells actionable, we deal with it quickly, and quietly.”
Don took a deep breath. This was moving very fast and not in the direction he had anticipated. Everett, Ramirez, and Goodwin needed to be extremely careful with their speculations in front of Mattias.
“Let’s see what your superstars have for us, Don,” Mattias said.
As the three officers trooped in together, Don couldn’t help but feel a swell of pride. The trio looked every inch the smart, young professionals they were—and he’d had a hand in making that transformation happen.
Dre Ramirez had been just what the group needed to reconstitute their previous balance of skills. She wore a business pantsuit that hung on her slim hips and a cream-colored blouse under a dark blue jacket. She was the first to greet Mattias and shook his hand with confidence as she introduced herself. Whatever demons she had been dealing with in Hawaii were behind her as far as Don could see.
Janet wore a stylish royal-blue dress and had pulled her blond hair back into a ponytail. She eyed Mattias warily. As the spokesperson for the group, she was sizing up her audience.
Michael Goodwin had paid a visit to the Men’s Wearhouse. His suit was off the rack, but the young man had the physique to make it look good. Don still harbored a special sense of pride in Goodwin. He’d recruited the young man to the Naval Academy and been there as he grew from a kid into a naval officer.
Mattias held on to Goodwin’s hand after they shook. “Michael Goodwin,” he said. “I read your paper on bioinformatics as it applies to warfare. Impressive.”
Don raised his eyebrows. He hadn’t known Michael had even authored a paper on bioinformatics.
Michael reddened. “Thank you, sir. It seemed like a natural connection. Predicting the variability of an epidemic seems like a good way to approach the larger issue of bioweapons. We spend so much time on the issue of lethality, but I think the real key is the transmission method.”
Mattias was still nodding as he took his seat. He surveyed the three officers. “It’s your dime, ladies and gentlemen. Don here tells me you three have been looking at this Nile River basin issue, top, bottom, and sideways. Let’s hear what you have to say.”
Janet touched the smart screen that was slaved to her desktop back in the Cave, the group nickname for their office. She summarized what they knew about the Mahdi so far.
“So, you think Egypt is behind the attack?” Mattias interrupted. “What about Iran?”
“The Mahdi is a religious figure in Islamic culture; the name roughly translates as ‘reborn’ or ‘messiah.’ The term is not in the Quran, but has broad cultural significance. Depending on which sect of Islam you are from, the meaning of the Mahdi can take different forms, but the general arc of the story is the same: the second coming of a unifying religious figure who precedes the Day of Judgment.”
Mattias stroked his chin. “Day of Judgment. That sounds ominous. Does the Mahdi give us any indication of how and when this day of judgment will take place?”
Janet shook her head. “The Mahdi and his followers take great care to ensure their message is able to be consumed by a secular audience.” She briefly described how the site accommodated language translation automatically. “They are extremely tech-savvy. To date, we’ve been unable to hack their website. That’s very unusual.”
“And what conclusions do you draw?” Mattias pressed her.
Don was relieved at Janet’s cautious answer. “They’re well funded, for starters. And they have access to some serious cryptographic resources.”
“But what’s their goal? They have a stated desire to remove all foreign direct investment from the region, which leaves what?” Mattias let the question hang in the air.
Goodwin spoke up. “I’ve examined the foreign investment in the region, sir.”
He threw a spreadsheet onto the screen and scrolled through a long list of projects separated by dollar amounts and region. The total was into tens of billions of dollars, with thousands of line items. Don’s eyes scanned through construction companies, business parks, medical clinics, schools, new road projects.
“There’s nothing here that is out of the ordinary for projects of this scale,” Michael continued. “Most of them are run via shell companies, which is par for the course in this region of the world, but all of them are legitimate as far as we can tell.”
“So, your conclusion is what?” Mattias continued pressing for an answer.
“I think we don’t really have enough—” Don began.
“I’d like to hear what your team has to say, Don,” Mattias said.
Janet spoke carefully, weighing her words. “Egypt would have the most to lose as these dams come online.”
“Is there any indication that Iran is backing this Mahdi operation?” Mattias asked.
“Nothing conclusive,” Janet said.
“There is another possibility,” Michael said.
The room went still. Janet, Dre, and Don all stared at the young man, but Michael had a pensive expression on his face. Don knew that look. Michael’s brain was working overtime. Don started to interrupt, but Mattias was quicker.
“Go on, Goodwin,” Mattias said. “I’d like to hear your thoughts.”
Michael scrolled to the top of the list of projects. “There is a massive amount of money being poured into the region. Whoever controls this part of the world essentially controls the fate of a good portion of the Middle East and northern Africa. These are some of the poorest countries on earth being catapulted into the twenty-first century in one giant step. What took a century in Europe or the US will take place in a decade in the Nile River basin. This is an economic realignment of massive proportions.”
“I’m listening,” Mattias prompted.
Don tried to signal to Michael to slow down, but the young man was too wrapped up in his own ideas to notice.
“This realignment cuts across political, cultural, and religious boundaries and deals with the very thing that defines life for the human race: water. If someone wanted to control this resource, this region, there would be no easy way to do it. No one—not even the US or Russia or the Saudis—could overthrow the governments of that many countries without someone objecting. But what if you took control from the ground up?”
“I’m not following,” Mattias said. The man seemed fascinated by Goodwin’s analytical ponderings.
“You have to own all of it,” Michael said, pointing to the list of investments. “You can’t just own one tree, you need to own the whole forest. If you owned enough of these companies, you could influence the region from the ground up. You harvest a tree here and there, but what you’re really doing is managing a forest of investments for your own gain.”
Don broke in. “Wow, Michael, that’s some story. I suggest we—”
“But it fits, Don,” Dre said. “And if he’s right, then the Mahdi is a distraction. What are the chances that a brand-new terrorist group with no known affiliations and great technical savvy just appears? The Mahdi gives us exactly what we’re conditioned to look for: terrorist attacks, the bloodier, the better. While we chase the terrorists, the real crime is being committed at the local level.”
“There’s one problem with this entire theory,” Don snapped. “You can’t prove any of it.”
“Yet,” Janet said.
“Pardon?” Mattias said.
“We can’t prove it yet,” she replied. “If Michael and Dre say it’s there, we’ll find it.”
“And how do you propose to do that?” Mattias asked.
Don wanted to scream at the three of them to shut up.
Michael, for whom Don’s anger had still not registered, squinted at the list of Nile River basin investments as he considered Mattias’s question.
“We set a trap,” he said.