Don stared at the paper in front of him, wishing that he could make the symbols give up their secrets by sheer force of will alone.
Key: gone. Shattered.
Charlie: gone. Kidnapped.
Information: gone. Lost, without the key or the man who developed the key to tell them what it said. So near, and yet so far. The paper held the information that he needed to get his brother back and yet there wasn't one person in this entire FBI headquarters who could decode the damn thing.
Even the NSA professed ignorance. Don himself had faxed the damn thing over to their in house experts, who were working hard at it even now. Without the key, they said, it would take days if not weeks. Just like Charlie had told him, so what the NSA said had a reasonable chance of being accurate.
At least now there was some action on a higher plane than his own. The NSA had flown in their own people who were walking in right now. The trio was comprised of two large and hulking types and one smaller man who was the thinker of the bunch.
The thinker was Rob Derrick, the man that Charlie had cut in on just yesterday on the phone, talking about their murder victim. The others? Well, Don had seen the bodyguard types before. This Rob Derrick must be pretty valuable, he remembered thinking, to rate this kind of protection outside of his ivory tower.
Derrick had quickly disabused him of that notion. "No, Special Agent Eppes—it is Eppes, isn't it? They're bodyguards, but not for me. They were supposed to be for your brother. Although it appears that we're a little late." He grimaced. "Comes from taking commercial airlines, having to wait through the security lines. I swear, my next budget line item is going to put in for a jet that isn't available for every Congressman and woman to conscript. This might not have happened if he'd had protection."
Don tightened his lips. "This might not have happened if you'd had the sense to let me in on how dangerous a situation this was for my brother." Derrick looked away. The remark was inflammatory, but Derrick deserved it and knew that he deserved it. There was no rebuke.
Derrick himself reminded Don of Charlie, although the man possessed flaming red hair. Both slight of frame, both had the same burning glint in their eyes that demanded answers to the universe's multitude of questions. Both had the quick mannerisms that said that they couldn't be bothered to wait for mere mortals to come up with the same answers. Don kept waiting for Derrick to mention a quadratic equation analysis cross-matched with a Poisson distribution.
Derrick sat Don and his team down, taking over a conference room on the fourth floor. Don's cubicle was too small.
"I'm here to offer help," Derrick began, sitting down at the head of table. "No, really," he said, noting the suspicious look that all four FBI agents cast in his direction. "He's your consultant, and your brother, but he has also done work for us. And Ames was our man," he added pointedly. "I think we have mutual goals here, Agent Eppes. I'm willing to lay our cards on the table, if you'll do the same."
"Fine." Don managed not to cross his arms, but it was a close call. "You start."
Another sigh. "I was afraid you were going to say that," Derrick told him. "You realize that I don't have much to offer?"
"Then neither do we." This time the arms did get crossed.
Derrick read the non-verbal message and gave in gracefully. "Ames was stationed in Damascus," he started. "He was one of our best field agents, sending back information about the situation in the Middle East. He was brilliant at knowing who he could contact, who gave him reliable information and who didn't, and putting the pieces together to form the whole puzzle. His loss will be keenly felt for years."
"Charlie told us pretty much the same thing," Don said, "as did the CIA." He let that statement ring out bold and bald. Don't rehash old data. Give me something new.
"The CIA is involved?" That came as news to Derrick; that was clear. "What's their angle?"
"Good question. I was hoping that you could tell us."
"Who was it?"
"The agent who came to see us? He identified himself as Mr. Tanner; his ID went through clean. He tried to tell us that Ned Ames was his man…" Don trailed away, thinking. "No, he didn't." He turned to his team. "You were there. Did he ever once actually come out and say that Ames belonged to the CIA?"
"Of course he did…" Like Don, Megan let her own voice drift off, thinking.
"You're right. He didn't." David came to the same conclusion. "He let us jump to that conclusion. He led us to where he wanted us. Like sheep." David Sinclair was not happy with himself. "It was only because we had Charlie that we were able to see through that ruse."
"I wouldn't get too annoyed," Derrick told him. "If this Tanner is who I think it is, he's one wily character. He's successfully fooled some of the greatest minds in the business. Medium height, medium hair, piercing eyes? Looks like he could blend into a crowd?"
"That description could fit a couple thousand people," Don said carefully.
"I was going to say that he's the man with a thousand faces, but I thought that was too trite." Derrick nodded. "Yes, I'll lay odds that Tanner is one of the CIA's high level operatives." He gazed out through the window, not really seeing the L.A. cityscape beyond. "Now what would you be wanting with Ned Ames?" he wondered to himself.
"And my brother," Don put in harshly.
"Well, yes, him too," Derrick agreed. "Though I expect that Charlie Eppes was merely a matter of convenience. Once the coded message surfaced, everyone wants to get their hands on it. In decoded form, of course, which is where your brother comes in. They could have their own experts work on it, but why waste your own resources when you can snatch someone else's? Particularly the guy who developed the code."
"Wait a minute," David protested. "Are you telling me that the CIA is responsible for kidnapping Charlie? An American citizen, on American soil? Why couldn't they try and hire him, like everyone else?"
Derrick shrugged. "Wouldn't put it past them. And, let's face it: your brother has the best chance of cracking that cipher of anybody around. He devised the basis of it. Take Ames just used the tool. And now that's he's dead and the key destroyed, the only person who has a reasonable shot at figuring out what that message says is Charlie Eppes."
"So what was Ned Ames working on?" Don leaned forward.
"A generalist, if you catch my drift—" Derrick started, when Don cut in.
"Generalities don't get us anywhere. I want specifics, and I want them now. Catch my drift?"
Not going any further. Derrick could see that plainly. If he wanted any more cooperation from the FBI, there would have to be something concrete. "Ames was our top man in Damascus, Agent Eppes. There were three areas that he was working on currently: Israeli troop movements vis a vis the Lebanon border, Hamas communication patterns, and a small piece of the Irani nuclear build up. All three were up to date when he disappeared."
"And you didn't go looking for him?"
"A weekly information drop was standard for him. Any sooner, and it would look too obvious for the couriers. Ned used a variety of couriers, anyone from American tourist style types to some of the more trustworthy street urchins who'd work for a few dollars and a pair of American sneakers. He missed the first drop, and we didn't worry. It happens. This isn't the most secure of positions. When he missed the second week, we sent someone out to investigate."
"And he found—?" Don pushed.
"Nothing. He's still looking; was, until I called him back after your call."
"Did he pick up any clues?"
"Not a thing," Derrick said easily.
Right, Don thought. This is where the cooperation comes to a screeching halt. My turn. "We don't have much, either," he confessed grimly, trying to put as much earnestness into his own voice as Derrick had. "We have a small part of what Forensics thinks is a crystal key to a code, but the other half was shattered when the object broke. It was subjected to intense heat, possibly an explosion. At this point, it's worthless. Even Charlie wouldn't be able to decode the message with the remnants of that key. You've already seen the autopsy report on the victim." Don carefully avoided saying 'your man.' Too many unpleasant associations there. Better to keep it as impersonal as possible. "We've recovered a letter sent to the office that contains information in code, as you know. Have your people made any progress on deciphering it?" There. I've just given you the same information that I gave you yesterday. Which is the same quantity that you have given me.
Derrick's frown said the whole answer. "Not a chance this side of the snowball in hell. This is Charles Eppes' work. His keys are as close to unbreakable as anything there is." He looked at Don. "Bottom line, if we don't find your brother, we might as well go whistling for whatever's in that letter. And I mean, find him alive. With his head in working condition."
Voices sounded outside of the door. Charlie huddled in a miserable ball in the corner of the room. It was the only reasonable place to be: there was no furniture, not even a rug to soften the hard concrete floor. A chair was a distant memory. He was in a large, empty square of a building with four solid walls around him. No way to leave.
To say that he hurt was off by several levels of magnitude. 'Beaten up' was too mild, and 'thoroughly thrashed' implied running away from the neighborhood bully. Charlie had done that before, when the bully was taller than he by several inches and out-weighed him by twenty pounds or more. How come bullies always seemed able to outrun him? Weren't they supposed to be slow and out of shape in additional to being cruel?
No, the previous couple of hours were more in the line of being taught exactly what his place in the scheme of things was to be. There was a task to be done, one that Charles Eppes had been selected to perform, and to let him know that there would be no dallying, his captors had taken the liberty of placing bruises every place on his body except for his head. That, they needed intact.
More voices outside the door. "He softened up?"
"Yes. No serious damage, but he should be quite willing to cooperate."
Charlie wasn't completely certain about that; the damage part. There was a jiggly feeling around the rib cage that didn't feel good at all. Not that he'd ever had a broken rib, and would be more than happy to find out that he'd kept that record unblemished, but still…
The door opened, and four men entered. One was the man with the gun who had shot Colby when they'd kidnapped Charlie himself. Charlie wondered about the young FBI agent. No one could have lived through a spray of bullets at that close range. Colby Granger must be dead, the rest of Don's team grieving over their loss. Two of the others entering had recently participated in the 'softening up' process that had just been spoken of. The one with the scar Charlie would have a hard time forgetting. He suspected that the scar would figure prominently in his nightmares for the next several months. Assuming he lived that long.
Big assumption, Eppes.
Okay, time to make a few more assumptions. Contrary to what his big brother continually told him, Charlie did indeed pay attention to the world around him. That this had something to do with Take Ames' death was a given, which meant that this collaboration of nasties wanted Charlie to do some serious cipher work. Fine; that Charlie could do but considering that they went to all this trouble to secure his cooperation, Charlie had a strong suspicion that these goons were not from his friends at the NSA, or his brother at the FBI. In fact, their appearance led him to believe that they were quite likely from one of the various Middle East extremist groups that Ned had been collecting information on. They all dressed in careful Western style clothing, selected to blend into the population and not stand out: jeans, tee's without any fancy wordings that would lead a passerby to glance a second time to try to read what was written across the chest. Actually, as a group, they were well-favored: strong, dark and even features, toned and in shape. Even the man with the scar carried the mark as almost a decoration. Charlie could imagine both Megan and Amita giving them all a second and possibly a third look.
Bottom line, whatever was in the message that Ned had sent, Charlie didn't want this bunch to have it. The kidnapping in broad daylight was a broad hint along those lines. The question was: what to do about it?
The answer was equally obvious: play along. Wait for Don to come looking for him. After the attack on Colby's car, Charlie was certain that a substantial portion of the L.A. branch of the FBI was working on determining his present location and, knowing Don, the FBI would have requested and received a lot of cooperation from the LAPD as well. Charlie's part in this mess would include staying alive until they could find him. Of course, should the opportunity to escape arise, Charlie wouldn't mind taking advantage of it.
Fortunately, no matter what, decoding the information without the key was going to take days if not a week or two. Now, if he could only convince his captors of that…
"Professor Eppes." The speaker was one of the handsome ones, looking cool and calm and comfortable. And un-bruised. Charlie, dumped onto the floor and uncertain of his ability to stand up unassisted, felt at a distinct disadvantage. "I imagine that you probably know why you're here."
Charlie cleared his throat, to give himself time to think. Gotta delay, preferably without annoying them to the point of more violence. "Tell me." It seemed like a safe thing to say.
The man grabbed Charlie by the shirt, hoisted him into the air, and slammed him gently against the wall. At least, to the man it seemed gentle. To Charlie, who had already received significant damage, it rattled his teeth. Blackness wavered around the edges. "You will decode the message. Now."
Gotta put up at least a token resistance. That's all they understand. I hope. "Go to hell."
The blow that followed was swift and predictable and doubled him over. The man dropped him to the floor, where Charlie simply lay gasping for breath.
"You will decode that message, Professor Eppes," the man assured him. A swift kick to the ribs—not the broken one!—turned Charlie onto his back. He stared straight up into the man's face.
The man held three photos in his hands. One by one he showed them to Charlie:
Larry Fleinhardt.
Alan Eppes.
Amita Ramajuan.
All of them, caught in an instant of time. One walking into the library. The other poised to enter a car. The third strolling across the CalSci quadrangle.
A cross-hatched target was casually penciled in over each face. The message was clear: cooperation or death.
Charlie coughed again, the movement catching at his ribs. "It will take days," he muttered desperately. "There's no key."
Once again the man grabbed his shirt. This time he sat Charlie up, shoved him against the corner. Charlie fought to keep from curling up into himself. The terrorist grabbed his hair, wrenched Charlie's face up to stare at him. "You have two days, Professor Eppes. On Day Three, one of these people will die."