“They let you out early,” Conley said as the guards shoved Morgan back into his cell.
“Place was a dump. Didn’t even have turn down service,” Morgan said.
Tunca was sitting at on his bed, reading. He lowered the book and greeted Morgan with a nod.
“How’s he doing?” Morgan said.
“A little sore but okay,” Conley said.
Then Morgan tossed Conley one of the ear comms.
“It’s operational now. I’ve been talking to Shep and Alex,” Morgan said.
“I see that Dr. Erdem is back in his cell. What’s going on?”
“I recognized the warden, though he didn’t see me…yet. He was one of the soldiers from Cyprus. The leader of that merry band.”
“We have to assume he’ll recognize you and that he’s still pissed about the eye,” Conley said. “Bloch will want us to abort.”
“Unless we come up with a better option. And do it pretty quick,” Morgan said.
“The last plan took months to put together. It also had the advantage of being quiet. We would have just disappeared. By the time they realized we were gone and figured it all out we would have been home.”
“Our new schedule may require us to make a little more noise,” Morgan said.
“You don’t say,” Conley said.
“I’m thinking a prison riot,” Morgan said.
“With this bunch?” Conley said, gesturing outside the cell.
That was a concern. The prisoners in this facility were not the rioting type. Students and journalists weren’t the violent, hardened criminals that usually led prison riots. Even if they did riot, the administration would have little trouble putting it down. That was why Zeta had rejected the riot scenario right off the bat.
“I’ve got a twist and I think I’ve got a way to make it work. But first we need to figure out some details. Can you ask Tunca if he’d like to leave?”
“You think?”
“He’s a native Turkish speaker. He might come in handy. Plus, I say we help him make the energy minister’s deals with terrorists front-page news. That is, if you think we can trust him.”
It wasn’t a simple question. Even if Tunca had nothing but hatred for his captors, there was no guarantee he wouldn’t use information to try to make a deal with them.
They would be betting the entire operation on a man they barely knew. Conley had been speaking to him and Morgan trusted his partner’s judgment.
“We can trust him,” Conley said.
“Okay, let’s get to work,” Morgan said.
* * * *
When Diana Bloch looked up, she saw Mr. Smith entering her office. He hadn’t called to tell her he was coming, or to give her a chance to prepare a report, or a briefing.
That told her that this was serious. And that he wanted nothing but straight unrehearsed answers from her.
Somewhere in his sixties, with his trademark tailored suit and neatly combed white hair, he appeared to be a CEO or hedge fund manager. Of course, in his life, Bloch knew that he may have likely been both of those.
He still was, in a way. If Diana functioned as a managing director of Zeta Division, he was the CEO—as well as a member of the board of the parent company, the Aegis Initiative.
He was also her boss. Or one of them. Of course, he was the only one of her supervisors she had actually met. The other members of that exclusive international club were even more private than Mr. Smith.
“Hello, Diana,” he said, extending his hand.
She shook it. “Sir.”
He gestured to her chair and said, “Please take a seat.”
He sat in the guest chair as she took her own place. Normally, that would put her in a position of power, but she had no illusions about who was in charge here.
“I understand there has been a complication in the mission in Turkey,” Mr. Smith said.
“Yes, we’re exploring other options. Normally I’d simply extract my agents but Cobra and Cougar want a little time to develop an alternative solution to our problem,” Diana said.
“Let them,” Mr. Smith said.
“Excuse me?” Diana said. It wasn’t a surprise that those two wanted to try to improvise a new mission plan when the last one took months to put together and years of groundwork, but Smith was much less…impulsive.
“We need Dr. Erdem extracted right away,” Mr. Smith said.
“My agents…”
“Know what they are doing. And they know the risks,” he said.
“What’s going on?” Diana said.
“Dr. Erdem’s work is very important to the space program, as you know. But his nuclear power system is very important to the United States’ new space-based weapons platform. We need that system, right away,” Mr. Smith said.
“I understand that. But I have two agents’ lives to consider,” Diana said. “And I’m trying to make sure we don’t burn the assets we’ve carefully put in place in the construction of the new Turkish prison system.”
“All important, but we need that scientist. And not to put too fine a point on it but President Shakir can’t have him. And I don’t mean we don’t want Shakir to have him, but we absolutely can’t allow his expertise to fall into the hands of a man like that.”
“Or what—Dr. Erdem will be eliminated?”
“Even if the United States didn’t do it, there are a half a dozen intelligence agencies who would. His lifespan would be measured in weeks. There are too many weapons applications to his work. And there are too many things that he can build that Shakir can never be allowed to have.”
“I see,” Diana said.
“How much confidence do you have in your agents?” Mr. Smith said.
“If anyone can do it,” Diana said.
“Then let’s hope they can,” Mr. Smith.
* * * *
After her conversation with her dad, Alex thought she was done being surprised for the day.
And then she spoke to Diana Bloch.
“What did she say? What are we authorized for?” Shepard asked.
“Whatever you need. She told me that you are authorized to do whatever you have to do to get them out. Whatever happens, Aegis wants the scientist. These orders come from Mr. Smith himself.”
Alex could see Shepard wrestling with that information. Usually, on field missions they were howling for resources and authorizations. Here they had a blank check.
“What about covering our tracks?” Shepard asked.
“If you can, but the mission comes first,” Alex said.
“Wow,” Shepard said.
Alex felt the same way. Zeta had spent years building back doors into the prison computer system, and planting tech throughout the prisons during their construction.
If President Shakir learned about any of that, they risked burning assets that could never be replaced. She figured Dr. Erdem must be very important.
“I can try to hide what we’re doing a bit. I can cover some of our work with strategic system crashes. And there are some other tricks,” Shepard said.
“As long as it doesn’t compromise the mission,” Alex said. “We need to get them all out.”
“I understand, but if your father ends up back in a Turkish prison in a year or two, I want to make sure we can get him out then too,” Shepard said.
“Fair enough,” Alex said. The fact was that Zeta agents as well as any number of American citizens or allies could easily end up guests of President Shakir in the near future.
“What do you need?” she said.
“I’ll talk to O’Neal. I can run it from here, but we’ll need the whole tech division on this,” he said.
“In the meantime, I’ll sort out some emergency transport options,” Alex said.
That was going to be tricky since they had no time and no details—because they would be making it up as they went along.
So all she had to do was figure out exactly how it all would end and develop a plan to have transportation waiting at the right place and time, and then develop an exfiltration plan from a country that would very likely be a hot zone for them before they were finished.
Alex ordered up some fresh coffee and they both got to work.