U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY, WASHINGTON, D.C.
Kill me now,” whispered Mike Califano to the attractive blonde next to him. They were seated in the third row of Training Room D at the Department of Energy’s headquarters on Independence Avenue. The lecturer at the front of the room was droning on for the third straight hour about security breaches at the nation’s sixty-five civilian nuclear power plants. Hypothetical breaches, that is. The type of “what-if” scenarios that only a roomful of pencil-pushing DOE security analysts could manage to dream up and get excited about.
But Califano was not excited. The lecturer at the front of the room was Roger Hutton, an insufferable know-it-all prick who had recently been promoted ahead of him. At the moment, Hutton was talking about the possibility of terrorists tunneling their way into the Savannah River nuclear facility in South Carolina, and he had dozens of classified diagrams and topographical maps to prove his theory.
Bullshit, Califano thought, shaking his head just as much as he thought he could get away with. He’d seen the real thing enough to know that none of these exotic scenarios was even remotely plausible. The real threat was—and always had been—the risk of an inside job, a saboteur who could be placed inside one of these plants and then wreak havoc upon receiving orders from the outside. Califano knew that once two or three such agents were in place at a nuclear facility, no amount of pencil-pushing analysts or high-tech security measures could stop an enemy intent on creating mayhem. And here was Hutton, blathering on about tunnels.
C’mon, man, Califano thought. He quickly scanned the audience and was surprised to see that nearly everyone was still diligently taking notes. These were men and women from the FBI, the CIA, the DIA, and other government agencies, who had all been sent to the Department of Energy for two days of training about the nation’s energy infrastructure and how to protect it from terrorism and other threats.
Califano crossed his arms and sighed, prompting a disapproving glance from the blonde next to him. She held his gaze for a moment before returning her attention to the lecture. But Califano kept his eyes fixed on her after she looked away. Why doesn’t she have a training booklet? he wondered. And why wasn’t she here this morning? He was still mulling these questions over when his cell phone suddenly buzzed in his pocket, eliciting another scornful look from his blond neighbor. Califano retrieved his phone discreetly and glanced down at the incoming secure text message. It read: SCIF, ASAP.
That could be only one person.
Califano immediately rose, gathered his training materials, and began making his way—disruptively—to the center aisle that led to the exit door at the back of the room. Roger Hutton stopped his lecture in midsentence with a look of disbelief on his face.
After a long, awkward interruption, Califano finally reached the center aisle, where he momentarily paused and met Hutton’s incredulous stare. “Oh, sorry,” he said with a shrug. “Gotta take a leak.”
The room erupted with laughter.
Califano turned to leave but suddenly stopped short, as if he’d forgotten something. “Oh yeah,” he said, turning back to face Hutton. Every eyeball in the room was now on Califano. “You know, there’s an important feature you forgot to mention on that map.” He pointed to the topographical survey map of the Savannah River that was currently being displayed on the large screen at the front of the room.
“What’s that?” asked Hutton with unveiled contempt.
“Got a pen?”
Hutton rolled his eyes and reluctantly retrieved a pen and paper from below the podium.
A moment later, Califano rattled off a long set of lat/long coordinates from memory, without the slightest bit of hesitation or appearance of mental effort. “Take a look at 33.33384 north and 81.73780 west.” He paused to let Hutton scribble down those coordinates. “There’s something important that everyone should see.” Califano gave a perfunctory nod, then turned and headed quickly to the exit.
Once Califano had slipped through the exit door at the back of the room, he immediately spun and caught the door just before it closed. He crouched low and peeked through the remaining crack at Hutton, who was still standing at the podium. “Come on, you tool,” Califano whispered to himself. He knew Hutton wouldn’t be able to resist checking the coordinates he’d just given him, if only to try to show him up. As he watched, he saw Hutton typing the coordinates into his laptop computer at the podium. “That’s it,” Califano whispered.
Seconds later, the large screen at the front of the room suddenly zoomed in on the precise coordinates Califano had just provided. In the center of the screen, large enough for the entire audience to see, were two words that Califano himself had electronically added to the map late last night, after hacking into Hutton’s presentation materials: BITE ME.
The audience roared with laugher.
With that, Califano turned and walked away with a satisfied grin. His work here was done.
The SCIF at the Department of Energy was located deep beneath the iconic James V. Forrestal Building at L’Enfant Plaza, which many considered to be one of the ugliest buildings in Washington, D.C. “An elephant teetering on giraffe legs,” was how the Washington Post had described the building when it opened in 1968. Indeed, the Forrestal Building was a particularly unflattering example of “Brutalist” architecture, a style that had swept through Washington, D.C., in the late sixties and early seventies. The fact that the building was named for a former secretary of defense who committed suicide by jumping from the sixteenth floor of Bethesda Naval Hospital only added to its melancholia.
Califano exited the elevator at the B–3 level and made his way to a gray metal door marked SCIF, which stood for Special Compartmented Information Facility. He pressed his key fob against a sensor beside the door, and the door clicked open automatically. He entered and allowed the door to swing shut behind him with a clank. “How ya doing?” he said to the guard at the front desk.
The guard nodded without altering his steely expression. “Empty your pockets.”
Califano complied, placing his wallet, cell phone, keys, and loose change in a small plastic bin on the table. The guard put the bin high up on a shelf behind him. “You can pick those up when you leave. If you need to take notes, use the pen and paper provided in the reading room, and leave your notes in the safe.”
“Right,” said Califano. After nearly eight years at the DOE, he knew the SCIF procedures cold.
“Arms up,” said the guard.
Califano spread his arms as the guard waved a metal-detecting wand all around his body. “Admiral Armstrong’s waiting for you in reading room four.”
Califano thanked the guard and made his way down a short hallway to reading room 4. He knocked twice and entered.
The reading room was about ten feet square, with bare white walls and a small table and four chairs in the center. There was a heavy-duty, security-grade filing cabinet pressed against one wall. Sitting at the table was a well-dressed man in his late sixties, with silver hair and a distinguished, weathered face. “Have a seat,” said Vice Admiral Robert Armstrong, deputy director of the National Security Agency.
Califano seated himself at the opposite side of the table.
“Michael,” said Armstrong. “You’ve been at DOE seven years.”
“Almost eight.”
Armstrong nodded. “Right, almost eight. A bit longer than we expected, to be sure. And I know you’re eager to move on to another assignment. But I wanted to let you know you’ve done a terrific job here.”
Califano shrugged. “Just routine stuff.”
“Nonsense. You’ve given us valuable insights into the foreign infiltration of our national labs, scientific espionage, technological intelligence that we simply could not have obtained through . . . normal channels. Nothing routine about it.”
“Am I getting a promotion?” asked Califano with a wry smile. He knew the answer was no.
“Sorry, Michael. A promotion would invite scrutiny. There would be fresh questions about your, uh . . . background.”
Califano nodded knowingly. His “background,” as the admiral had so quaintly put it, should have automatically disqualified him for this job. Indeed, as Califano well knew, he was lucky to have any job, let alone a job with an SCI security clearance and a direct line to the deputy director of the NSA. And he owed all of this to Admiral Armstrong.
“Besides,” Armstrong added, “you’d spend all your time supervising others, writing personnel evaluations, pushing paperwork. You don’t want to do all that stuff, do you?”
Califano shook his head emphatically. He hated bureaucracy with a passion.
“Trust me. You’re most valuable to us where you are right now, an assistant security auditor with no subordinates. Totally below the radar.”
“But I’m getting a little old for this position, aren’t I?” In fact, at thirty-four, Califano was already the second-oldest assistant auditor in the department, and the only one who’d held that position for seven straight years.
Armstrong seemed amused by this question. “Hmm, let’s see, Michael. You’re insubordinate and openly disrespectful to your supervisors. You keep bizarre hours, and you’re chronically late with your audit reports. Hell, you can’t even be bothered to follow the department’s dress code.”
“What? I’m wearing a blazer.”
“Yeah, over faded jeans and tennis shoes. Definitely not authorized. Plus your hair’s too long.”
“There’s no regulation on hair. I checked.”
“My point is, Michael, I don’t think anyone around here is surprised that you haven’t been promoted in nearly eight years.”
Califano smirked. “Yeah, I guess not.”
Armstrong reached across the table and patted Califano’s arm. “You’re a good man, Michael. An asset to this department and the NSA. The best scientific intelligence analyst we’ve ever had. Stick with us a little longer, and I promise I’ll get you that transfer you’ve been asking for.”
Califano nodded his unspoken appreciation.
Then Armstrong straightened in his chair, his expression suddenly turning grave. “But right now, I need your help on something very serious.”
Califano leaned forward, intrigued. Anything to get him out of Hutton’s training.
“There’s been some activity in one of your programs. We don’t understand what it means, and we need your help figuring it out. I’m afraid there’s not much time.”
“Which program?” Califano was already mentally organizing a list in his head of more than fifty top-secret research programs that he routinely monitored, flagging in his mind the most likely candidates for having recent and unusual activity.
“Winter Solstice.”
The thin program file for Winter Solstice instantly appeared in Califano’s photographic memory. “But that program is—”
“Dormant, I know.”
“No, not just dormant. I mean, it hasn’t had activity since . . .” His brain searched for the correct date.
Armstrong beat him to it. “Since 1959.”
“Right. So why would there suddenly be activity in that program now?”
Armstrong checked his watch and pushed back from the table. “I’ll explain it on the way.”
“On the way where?”
Armstrong pointed straight up. “The roof.”