Part 22 (1/2)

”Do you remember what happened?” asked Connelly.

”Good question,” said Griffin, tilting his head for several long seconds. ”I remember what I accomplished,” he said finally. ”I only have the vaguest idea how.” He held out his hands in wonder. ”I was like a hotrodding G.o.d,” he said in awe. ”What I was able to do in an hour, I couldn't do normally if I was given a thousand years.”

Griffin continued to take inventory of the past hour and a guilty expression came over his face. ”I was a bit of an a.s.shole, wasn't I?”

”I wouldn't say that at all,” said Desh. ”You were a total a.s.shole.” He grinned. ”But don't worry about it. Your work was phenomenal.”

Griffin turned to Kira and shook his head in wonder. ”That's quite a treatment you've got there,” he said admiringly. Still facing her, he let out a heavy sigh and the smile retreated from his face. ”Got anything to eat?” he asked eagerly.

43.

Matt Griffin quickly proceeded to devour four bagels and then started in on a large bag of corn chips Kira had given him. Desh released the giant from his bonds while crumbs rained onto his head at a steady pace.

Once Griffin had been restored to full freedom, the entire group gathered around him as best they could in the tight s.p.a.ce. ”My superhuman alter ego may not win any Miss Congeniality awards,” he said, ”but he sure was a G.o.d of the cyber domain. Allow me to demonstrate.” Griffin hit a few keys and a satellite photo came up on one of the monitors. It showed a central residence and two small, red barns, contained within the expansive grounds. The house was nestled among several mature trees. About thirty yards from the house a number of tiny horses could be identified milling about inside a fenced-in area about the size of a football field.

”This is the Sam Putnam residence,” explained Griffin.

”He lives on a farm?” said Kira in surprise.

”A small one,” said Griffin. ”And he doesn't actually farm anything. But he does have eight horses and two barns.”

”A perfect layout for him,” noted Desh. ”It lets him be isolated from near neighbors without seeming to be a recluse. He's just a rugged outdoorsman. And while the farm must have been expensive, it isn't showy enough to make anyone wonder how he could afford it.”

”And the isolation leaves open numerous options for security,” added Metzger.

”Where is it?” asked Kira.

Griffin worked the mouse and zoomed out, showing the scene from a far higher alt.i.tude. Putnam's farm disappeared. As if by magic, a map with borders and place names was overlaid onto the satellite image. Griffin pointed at the center of the screen. ”Putnam lives here,” he said. ”In Severn Maryland.”

The town was directly between Was.h.i.+ngton to the southwest and Baltimore to the northeast. It was at most fifteen minutes away from NSA headquarters at Fort Meade.

While the group studied the map, Griffin pulled up a page of information about the town and left it on the adjacent monitor. Severn had been a small rural town for most of its existence, but in the past several decades it had seen explosive growth given its proximity to D.C. and Baltimore and the growth of the government, including the NSA. While much of the town was originally zoned as rural farmland, the vast majority of land had now be rezoned for residential purposes. Putnam owned one of the few remaining properties that could be designated as a farm.

Griffin changed the view of Putnam's property, zooming in to give the view from about a hundred feet overhead. ”He has enough video cameras blanketing the property that there are virtually no blind spots. They all feed into two separate banks of monitors, one bank inside his bedroom and the other,” he said, pointing to the barn that was the farthest from the residence, ”inside here.”

Griffin moved the view a few hundred yards from the residence and zoomed in until a relatively una.s.suming fence came into view. ”This is a chain-link fence, ten feet high, completely encircling the periphery of the property,” he announced. ”It looks innocent enougha”almost inviting. No razor wire, no electricity. But don't be fooled. It has vibration sensors. Try to climb over it or cut through it and your exact location is revealed.”

Griffin showed a closer view of the main dwelling. ”There's a microwave perimeter exactly twenty feet out from the house. Break the beam and once again Putnam will know about it.” He raised his eyebrows. ”Presupposing you could get over the first fence without any alarms going off, and he didn't see you on the monitors.”

”How do you know all this?” asked Metzger.

”He has a very advanced system,” explained Griffin. ”He has a computer devoted just to home security, and this is tied into the Internet. That way, anyone with the proper codes can check all of the video feeds and security monitors from any computer.”

”And you hacked into this computer?” said Kira.

”Yes. And reprogrammed it while I was inside,” said Griffin proudly. ”For the next twenty-four hours the system will ignore certain inputs. Cut through the fence and break the microwave barrier and the system won't notice. The video monitors are set to show the same benign view of the estate on a continual basis.”

Desh scratched his head. ”It doesn't make sense to have a security system online that's vulnerable to what you just did,” he said.

”I agree,” said Griffin. ”But it isn't vulnerable. A top-drawer hacker could hack into the system and identify what security safeguards are in place. But anyone skilled at storming this kind of heavily protected castle could do that in other ways. But reprogramming it the way I did simply isn't possible with normal human faculties. Trust me on this one.”

”Did you get anything useful from his personal computer?” asked Kira eagerly. ”Anything that might give us a lead to the sterilization plot?”

Griffin frowned. ”No. He didn't have any computers online during the time I was altered. I suspect he only allows an online connection to be active when he's using it, and then physically disrupts the connection when he isn't.”

This was a bad break, thought Desh. But all things considered, Griffin had accomplished more than Desh could ever have hoped for.

”Let's get back to Putnam's security,” said Desh. ”Are you telling us that we can just waltz in there undetected for the next twenty-four hours?”

”Almost,” said Griffin. He worked the mouse and different views of Putnam's property came into view, one of which showed a tiny human figure. He zoomed in closer and a man came into focus wearing jeans, a t-s.h.i.+rt and a cowboy hat. He was putting out hay for the horses. He wasn't wearing a jacket, which meant the footage Griffin had tapped into was probably several months out of date.

”Security information from the monitors and alarms is fed to two men,” said Griffin as he zoomed in tight on the man's waist, revealing an automatic weapon and walkie-talkie. ”He's one of them.”

”Interesting,” said Metzger. ”This guy's cowboyed up so most people will take him as a farmhand.”

”He doubles as a farmhand from the look of it,” commented Connelly.

”You said two men,” said Desh. ”Where is the other one?”

”The security computer logs indicate that one of the men is almost always in the barn, manning the monitors.”

”Won't the guard in the barn realize something is wrong when his colleague fails to show up on the monitors?” asked Desh.

Griffin grinned broadly. ”When Kira makes you smart, she makes you prodigiously smart,” he said happily. ”I took this into account. I only altered the outer cameras, focusing on the chain-link fence and the grounds beyond the outer barn. He'll be able to see his friend, all right,” he said happily. ”But not anyone sneaking up on him from the outer perimeter.”

Desh nodded approvingly. ”Anything else we should know?” he asked.

Griffin considered. ”I don't think so,” he replied. ”An alarm would normally go off if the house was breached in any way, but my modifications won't allow this to happen.” He eyed Desh. ”Unfortunately, I can't program these two guys to ignore you,” he said.

Desh didn't appear concerned about this in the least. ”You've done great, Matt,” he said warmly. ”With no alarms or video of our approach, they shouldn't be much trouble.”

”So what's the plan?” asked the major.

All eyes turned to Desh. Even though he was no longer in the militarya”and even if he was both Connelly and Metzger would have outranked hima”everyone knew this was his show.

”I don't think confronting Putnam right now buys us much,” began Desh. ”Capture, followed by torture, might be an option at some point, but I wouldn't suggest it as a first move.” He paused. ”Comments? Disagreements?”

There was silence for several long moments, but no one objected.

”When do you think capturing Putnam would be the right move?” asked Connelly.