KANDAHAR
The joint intelligence fusion cell was abuzz with energy. Steph stood in a corner of the long rectangular room tapping her foot nervously as she surveyed the scene. An assortment of army intelligence officers, representatives of all the nations involved in Afghanistan, stood in front of the computer screens lining the long wooden table that ran the length of the room. Wires hung from the ceiling connecting the workstations, ensuring that connectivity was maintained across the different task forces. The officers watched the grainy black-and-white footage anxiously as their units began to withdraw from their targets. This had been a huge day of operations; in a modern adaptation of the German Blitzkrieg, a multitude of targets had been attacked simultaneously. This ‘saturation’, as it was referred to, was designed to keep the Taliban leadership from being able to mount any counterattacks or quick reprisals.
‘Okay, gang, I think that’s a wrap of this afternoon’s targeting serials. Get your data together from this end and make sure that you contact your units and find out what they came up with.’ The baby-faced lieutenant colonel from Delta Force was broad-shouldered, tall and handsome with a perpetual tan, his short, jet-black hair parted to one side. He looked around the room and smiled, and the room smiled back.
‘We’ll meet back in here at eighteen-thirty, folks, if no one has an issue with that?’ Despite his pleasant tone, everyone recognised it for the order it was and made no objections. ‘Good. We’ll go round the grounds then and see if we’ve turned up anything interesting.’ Since he had taken over the fusion cell they had become an efficient team. No stone was left unturned and all the information gathered from the assigned missions was captured, interpreted and used for future targeting.
Steph tucked in her brown t-shirt and tightened her ponytail before slowly walking across the room. She spotted her own reflection in a small window on one of the side office doors. In that second she noticed how bright red her face was. She felt like she was about to be sick.
Taking a deep breath, she approached Captain Geoff Langston, the Australian targeting officer for the Special Operations Task Group posted inside the targeting and fusion cell.
‘Hey there, Geoff, how’s it going?’ Steph said, forcing herself to sound cheery.
‘All good, thanks, ma’am.’ Geoff looked up from a series of photos that he was poring over.
‘Glad to hear it,’ Steph said. ‘So all the guys are back safely then, no issues?’
‘Yep, they’re all fine.’ Geoff looked up at her. ‘Can I help you with something, ma’am, do you need something?’ Geoff switched off his monitor, rose from his chair and turned to face her. It was unusual for a senior CIA analyst to be interested in the SOTG’s operations; that sort of interest was usually reserved for what Combat Applications Group, better known as Delta Force, were up to. This wasn’t lost on Geoff. He noticed her face, too, as he turned off the monitor; there was the slightest indication that she was taken aback by this, a barely perceptible widening of the eyes. ‘Oh, sorry, that’s just an old habit that was beaten into us on the intelligence course.’ He smiled at her.
‘Oh, of course, yes, I do the same – an old habit. I didn’t even notice really.’ Steph looked around to see who was in earshot. ‘So, I thought I should just tell you that I had a source in the area of your task group’s raid this afternoon. I want to make sure that he wasn’t lifted, you know?’
‘I see.’ Geoff watched as others around the room started to clear out to go and grab coffees and get prepared for the next couple of hours that would be spent analysing the data they’d collected. He turned his focus back to Steph, leaning forward so that the others around couldn’t hear. ‘Well, that’s meant to be identified prior to our guys conducting their missions, Steph.’ Geoff didn’t like the way the CIA could pick and choose their operating procedures to suit themselves, and he enjoyed alternating between using her name and calling her ‘ma’am’, depending on the point he wanted to make with her.
‘To be honest, I only found out that he was in the area after the raid went in. I thought he was in Pakistan, so I didn’t bother raising it; he wasn’t even meant to be in the country.’
‘So I presume you filed an out-of-country report on him? If you did, I must have missed it – or maybe we didn’t receive it. Could you get me a copy? That way I can make sure that, if we do have him, he isn’t interrogated as part of the process. If you could get me that report, I’ll pass it on to Sam Long down at the SOTG.’
Steph’s pulse quickened. Shit, she thought. She hadn’t expected that Geoff would know the procedures so thoroughly and the mention of Sam Long concerned her.
Geoff sensed that he had got the upper hand, but he couldn’t be bothered taking it any further. ‘I’m just joking, ma’am. Anyway, we didn’t take anyone off the target today, so your man is safe.’
Steph bit her bottom lip and then nodded slowly at Geoff, realising how clumsy her approach had been. ‘I see. Well, that’s good news. Thanks.’ Steph fought hard to contain her relief. ‘You’re right, though, Geoff – I should have completed an out-of-country report. I completely forgot about it.’
Geoff sat back down and turned on his computer screen. In one corner of the screen was the Sametime chat program used to pass real-time information between Kandahar and Camp Russell. Steph could see that Geoff was in a conversation with Sam and saw the words DRY HOLE, the term used to describe when there was no intelligence value on a target.
She turned and started to walk off, making a mental note to tread lightly around the Australian in the future.
‘Oh, Steph, one more thing, now that I think of it,’ Geoff called out just as she was making her way to a door being held open for her by one of the officers returning with a tray of coffees. She turned her head to look back at him. ‘We picked up a couple of cell phones from the target. I’ll let you know if there’s anything significant on them.’ Geoff nodded to her and turned back to his screen.
Steph walked out into the hallway half in a daze. The realisation that the cell phone she had given Faisal might be in the SOTG’s possession was terrifying, especially as she had broken her own protocol and rung the number from her personal mobile to warn him rather than sending a coded message and using her drop phone. Holy shit, this is bad, she thought.