A/N: Welcome back to the story. Thank you again to those who have reviewed, your encouragement is truly appreciated. As before, any sections in italics represent the thoughts of the character.
Chapter 5: Chuck versus the Piranha
Casey had seen the second shot from the recoilless rifle, again dodging behind the counter. He didn't know who the new shooter was, but the new guy evidently hadn't learned the lesson from his dead teammate. The second shot slammed into the reinforced front door, mangling the steel beams, but being just as ineffective as the first shot had been at breaching the shop.
While the kevlar reinforced counter would provide some level of protection, Casey was forced to accept the fact that his position inside the yogurt shop was no longer defensible. It was time to follow the mantra of Gunny from so many years before. One last time Casey pointed the barrel of his M4 out of the window, this time draining the clip on full automatic in a "spray and pray" maneuver that he normally would frown on. This time, there was method to the madness, as he carried out the shoot and scoot move, pinning down the outside enemy forces before slipping back toward the OO freezers to set up a new defensive position, this time deep inside the heavily armed fortress known as Castle. He could hold off a siege indefinitely from the sanctuary of his underground base. He would be damned if he let any Ring agent make it past the doorway into Castle while Casey was still breathing.
Running at a crouch, Casey got to the OO freezer and was just closing the door behind him as the more and more rounds from the Ring mercenaries found their way into the shop's interior. As Casey initiated the retinal scanner, a grin formed thinking about showing these Ring pukes his collection of "toys" down in Castle's armory. He was looking forward to giving Betty, his M134 mini-gun, some combat experience. Despite his repeated requests, Beckman had never authorized him to use Betty on any of the Intersect missions. If the Ring troops managed to access Castle's inner door, he would have quite the welcome waiting for them inside.
Making a mental note to thank Bartowski for streamlining the code on the retinal scanner to speed up access to the freezer door, Casey entered a manual override on the main door from inside Castle, then hustled to the armory to get supplies for a little area denial when the knuckleheads outside tried to get into his base. He knew the Ring would soon breach Castle's perimeter, but they would be in for a shock when they tried to get into Castle's keep. Betty was downstairs, and the gatling gun that was begging for a little action.
Inside Castle, Casey quickly set to work on creating a layered defense, his own version of area denial. He set up trip wires linked to claymore mines on the stairwell, positioned so that the wire wouldn't be tripped until the Ring point man was well down the stairs. The anti-personnel mines, however, were positioned up and down the stairwell and were daisy-chained so that any Ring troops following behind the point man would be caught up in the blasts.
He next overturned the large conference table, setting up Betty with her five barrels trained on the door leading to the OO freezer. Casey lugged box after box of belt fed ammo from the armory to be positioned next to Betty once the action started. Casey strapped on a backpack, filling the pouches with clips for the M4 rifle, and attaching hand grenades to every available hook. He strapped on thigh holsters for his beloved Sig Sauer P226 and his Desert Eagle .50 caliber handgun.
Moving over to his computer console, Casey tried to bring up the outside surveillance cameras, only to find that the feeds were all disabled. Given the number of cameras, and the fact that he had hidden them himself, Casey was now sure that there was an inside source for the Ring. It was time for him to update Beckman.
"General," Casey reported in over his cell phone as the external feed was just as dead as the surveillance cameras. "I've got a hostile force assaulting Castle. There are at least 12 in the opposition force, possibly more. I've put down three so far, possibly four, but had to fall back from the OO storefront. They managed to penetrate the bulletproof glass with a recoilless rifle. I have taken up a defensive position in Castle. The power lines are down, but the backup battery systems are functioning. I should be able to hold them off for four, maybe five days. I've got mines on the stairwell, an M134 with 2,500 rounds, as well as the usual suspects from Castle's armory. I've also got several dozen Hot Pockets, so rations are secured."
"Ma'am, they've cut the feed to the surveillance cameras, as well as disabled the computer data lines. All indications on this end are at least inside information if not a fully inside job. But I can assure you ma'am, they will not take Castle. If necessary, I'll set scuttling charges throughout the base to ensure that no hostiles can lay their dirty, stinking hands on our mech."
"Colonel, we've been monitoring Ring chatter. We cannot let the information on the computer systems fall into the hands of the Ring. The consequences would be nearly as bad as the asset being captured. Do what it takes to protect Castle. And for god's sake, get some real food down there for future emergencies. Hot Pockets!" With a grunt that rivaled Casey, General Beckman abruptly cut the phone call off. Casey wouldn't haven expected anything less, although he was a little hurt by the cheap shot at his favorite food group.
The communications room on board the SSN Key West was cramped quarters on the best of days. With the Captain and two spooks in the room, there was barely room to breathe. After the Captain keyed in the videoconference, Chuck took the seat by the computer. Given the minimal space and lack of other options, Sarah elected to sit in Chuck's lap.
"This is the situation as we currently know it," said General Beckman staring into the video monitor. "At 0940 hours this morning a group of men launched an attack against Castle. Colonel Casey was in the Orange Orange at the time this all began, and has since locked down Castle. We are confident that this is an action by the Ring, as our satellites providing coverage for this area were all mysteriously taken off-line for servicing just before this all began. Both primary and backup power to Castle have been cut. In his last communication, Colonel Casey reported that he was unharmed, but, since power has been cut I have instructed him only to contact us on an as needed basis. We have personnel on the scene, but given the public nature of the assault, there is a significant presence of local law enforcement personnel so our agents are limited in their ability to gather relevant information."
"One moment, General," said Chuck as he reached over to a keyboard for a computer in front of him. He quickly began typing away at the key board. Sarah could barely see the lines of code he was typing before he'd move on to the next line of code.
"Mr. Bartowski," General Beckman snapped, "while we are aware of your proficiency with repairing computers, what what do you expect that you can do that my specialists here in Fort Meade are unable to do?"
"Well, General," Chuck replied as he continued typing away on the keyboard, "I hadn't talked much about my hacking background before our little adventure began, because I was concerned over whether the FBI or NSA might be looking for me. Honestly, I walked away from that world before the communication from Bryce Larkin. I never did anything bad, but at the time, there were few…well, very few, places that I couldn't get into if I wanted."
"Mr. Bartowski, I can assure you that at the start of your involvement in our Project you were thoroughly vetted. Neither the NSA nor the FBI had any interest in you before you received that email."
"She's right Chuck," Sarah interjected, surprised that Chuck had not only keep some of his background secret from the NSA and CIA, but that he'd never mentioned a hacking background to his girlfriend…cover girlfriend, never mentioned it to his cover girlfriend. "The CIA had very little on you, certainly nothing about any experience as a computer hacker."
"Well, I'm pretty sure there was some interest in finding me. But it wasn't Chuck Bartowski, or even Charles Carmichael, that they would have been looking for. Back then I dabbled in the hacker world using the handle 'The Piranha.' I did my best to keep him a ghost, but I'm pretty sure he was starting to attract a little heat. Now then, I believe I can access some other satellites that the Ring may not have been able to, or simply didn't think to, disable."
There was stunned silence from both General Beckman and Sarah. Both were well aware of the hacker known as The Piranha, although for somewhat different, albeit related, reasons. The NSA were well aware of the white hat hacker known as The Piranha, and once even had a small team dedicated to trying to locate him in order to bring him into the NSA fold. Chuck was right, The Piranha was a ghost, appearing and disappearing at will with no trace of where he came from or where he went. Beckman was shocked that she had had such a high value target on her team this whole time.
Still seated in Chuck's lap, Sarah had gone rigid at these words. Sarah had a far more practical reason for knowing of The Piranha. She had heard some murmurs at Langley about a hacker who accessed all sorts of government systems, including highly classified systems, but instead of causing havoc instead notified the system administrators of the flaws in their security systems so that other hackers wouldn't be able to duplicate his methods. It had been those activities that had brought Chuck's alter ego to the attention of the NSA and FBI.
Sarah, however, had been on a deep cover assignment in Kazakstan when The Piranha had notified the FBI of a mole on the staff of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee who had been sharing information with the Russian FSB. The Piranha notified the FBI that he had been playing Call of Duty when two of the players started communicating with each other, but not about the MMORPG. He had traced the online characters to their users computers, then breached the firewalls on each computer and realized that the unusual discussion had been a notification to the Russian spy of a dead drop.
The mole and his Russian handler had assumed that the online game would provide anonymity so that they could camouflage their messages in the heat of battle. Chuck dug deeper into the computer of the mole, and discovered the information that was to be delivered to the drop-namely information about a deep cover CIA agent in Kazakstan, including her cover name and cover job and physical description. Although the Russians learned of the CIA agent's cover name and job before Chuck could alert the Feds, the warning from The Piranha was early enough for the FBI to warn their CIA counterparts, who in turn were able to extract Sarah mere minutes before the FSB team arrived at her apartment to arrest her.
Sarah had always been grateful to the anonymous hacker who had not only saved her from a black mark on her record for a failed mission, but saved her from torture and years of imprisonment as she had been operating under a non-official cover (NOC). A CIA agent caught in a foreign country under a NOC didn't have the luxury of diplomatic immunity. They would be thrown in a deep hole, and could only hope that sometime down the road the US government would be able to arrange for a prisoner exchange in order to secure their freedom.
All this time, I thought that Chuck and I had crossed paths due to our respective ties to Bryce Larkin-it was still strange to her that she owed the greatest relationship of her life to her former partner/boyfriend. In reality though, their paths had crossed years before that, although Chuck had been hiding behind The Piranha handle, while Sarah masqueraded behind her cover name. Even back then Chuck was looking out for her, keeping her safe.
Both Sarah and Beckman refocused on the present when Chuck blurted out, "Got it!" Some murmuring followed, then rapid pounding on the keyboard, followed by, "This should work nicely."
"Mr. Bartowski, would you like to share with the class exactly what is it that you've got?" Beckman somehow managed to simultaneously look impressed with Chuck for hiding his hacker background and frustrated with his not saying what it was that he was up to.
"Ha ha," said Chuck, as he kept pounding away at the keyboard oblivious to the shocked looks on the faces of Sarah and General Beckman. "There is a Russian reconnaissance satellite that is over the area now. I was just convincing it that it is running a diagnostic test, so that we can discreetly use its cameras to see what is going on over at the Orange Orange, without the folks in Moscow being able to see what we see."
Sarah focused her attention on the video monitors in front of her. "Chuck, can you switch this feed from thermal to visual?" Sarah asked as she pointed to a particular feed. Chuck instantly started typing away. Moments later the view that Sarah requested was up on the monitor.
"Agent Walker, what is it you that you are seeing there," inquired General Beckman. "It seems Mr. Bartowski is more accomplished at gathering intel then my own specialists," she grumbled. Not only was he showing up her top personnel, but a hugely significant skill set had been left out of his write up at the start of the mission. Heads would be rolling once the immediate crisis was averted.
"Well, General," replied Sarah, "we have what appears to be 16 troops attacking the Orange Orange. Two are heavy gunners, the rest are equipped with small arms. The front door of the Orange Orange appears to have been damaged by an explosive. There is some ancillary damage to the roof that would explain the backup power being lost."
"It appears that Casey has neutralized four of the assault team. Also, while there is heavy damage to the windows and front door of the Orange Orange, the building itself seems to be intact. As you indicated General, there is a large police presence in the area around the Buy More Plaza, although they cordoned off well away from the Plaza itself."
"Mr. Bartowski," General Beckman interjected, "I hope that the Russians will not get wind of the fact that you have hijacked one of their reconnaissance satellites using highly classified technology from a Navy submarine. For that matter, we don't want the Russians to be able to reverse the field and penetrate the Key West's computer systems."
"No need to worry General," Chuck, replied. "I've piggybacked the feed off of a North Korean communication satellite. If the Russians look, they will be forced to conclude that it was the North Koreans who somehow access their system. I've already erased any traces of my back door entry into the North Korean satellite system. And for good measure, once we're done I will shut off the cooling systems to the Korean satellite causing all of its hardware to overheat."
"I'll just insert this here…And now it will look like a screw up by the North Korean Unit 121. Just think of this as a little payback for that hack of Sony Pictures. Nobody messes around with Spider-Man."
The sub skipper raised his eyebrows at the cool composure of the young man wielding the computer like a weapon. But as the NSA director herself appeared to be content with the methods used by the unlikely looking spook with ridiculously curly hair, that was good enough for the skipper. Deciding that he'd better get back to the conn, he excused himself from the room, trying to forget all that he'd heard as he was pretty sure that he wasn't cleared for most of it. He thought back to the intense glare of the beautiful spook when she had first come aboard the sub, "We were never here." That was probably the best advice he'd gotten all year. They simply were never there, so he didn't see or hear any of that.
"Hold on a second here," Chuck spoke to himself. "It looks like the Russian bird is able to pick up some chatter in addition to the overhead images. The location is definitely the Buy More Plaza, although I'm not sure if it's the Russian ReconSat or the kludge technology on the North Korean satellite, but I can't narrow it down much further. It appears to be encrypted voice communications, must be the Ring agents talking to each other."
"Chuck, are you sure about this? The NGIA has checked out that satellite, but had no indication that it had SigInt capabilities," General Beckman said as she reviewed the known information on the Russian satellite that Chuck had appropriated. She was so focused on the information, she didn't appear to have noticed using Chuck's first name. Chuck was likewise dialed in to the action and missed it himself. Sarah, however, was pleased at the slip up by the Director. It was a sign of just how impressed General Beckman was with Chuck's abilities that she was so informal in speaking to him.
"General," Sarah cut in, "there appear to be several encrypted signals in the area of the Orange Orange, but there is another lone signal in the Plaza, but further away. If I had to say, I'd guess that the assault team has themselves a spotter who was pre-positioned before all of this went down."
"General," Chuck questioned, "what information do we have on any threats beyond the Orange Orange?"
"At this time there is nothing Mr. Bartowski. Why do you ask?"
"Well, General, I don't think there was any threat to either me or Sarah. Information shows that the Ring had an inside source. An attack timed for just before all the stores open for business would mean there would be minimal civilians around. And neither Sarah nor I have seen anything remotely suspicious today. It seems to me, that this was an attack on Castle, probably to get our Ring intel. Sarah and I need to get back there and help Casey."
"Sarah, does anything about this attack strike you as strange?" Chuck asked, his attention locked onto the monitors in front of him.
"Yes, I was just thinking that myself," Sarah replied. "The squad attacking is set up in a half circle, which is efficient for laying down fire, but there's no sign of anyone watching for either an escape or for reinforcements from the rear of the Orange Orange."
"Their spotter must be somewhere behind the shop," Chuck responded. "Someone there that was watching, timing this attack. The question is where?"
"I've got it," he shouted a moment later. "The mini van with tinted windows. It's all by itself in the parking lot, but not right in front of the Underpants, Etc. General, do we have any information on how long that minivan has been parked there?"
"Let me get my personnel here working on that, as well as looking into the other information you've developed," Beckman responded. "15 minutes while trapped underwater in a submarine on an unfamiliar computer system and you've come up with far more information that the team of specialists I've got working under me here. I'm guessing that the NSA should have tried harder to track down The Piranha when they had the chance. Nice work."
Just as General Beckman was reaching for the button to kill the videoconference feed, she paused and looked back into the camera, "Oh, and Agent Walker, while I admire your dedication to preserving the cover even during such extreme circumstances, you should know that the Captain left Comms five minutes ago. I'm not sure that it was necessary for you to remain seated in Mr. Bartwoski's lap this entire time." With her trademark scowl, Beckman jabbed the disconnect button, ending the meeting with her usual lack of finesse.
Sarah flushed scarlet. She had been perfectly aware of when the Captain had left Comms, listening to be sure that the door was fully sealed. It simply hadn't occurred to her to leave her seat in Chuck's lap. From the moment she had heard the emergency evacuation signal on their phones, a deep seated fear for Chuck's safety had overwhelmed her thoughts. Given the cramped space inside the Communications room onboard the Key West, when it had been the three of them, it had made sense for her to sit in Chuck's lap as there simply wasn't enough space to go around. But once there, the physical contact with Chuck had calmed her fears and let her concentrate her considerable focus, intelligence and skills on the task ahead.
Sarah's blush grew deeper as she realized that when she had sat in Chuck's lap, not only had her right arm draped around his shoulders, but at some point on its own volition her right hand had started to play with the curls sticking out over the collar of his shirt. While she was able to still her fingers, she was unwilling, unable even, to give up the physical connection to Chuck- even after Beckman had called her out on it.