in check. He’d been racking his brain for signs of Colin’s betrayal. Little things he could’ve missed. Hints Colin might’ve dropped that something was wrong.
But Hicks knew he hadn’t missed anything. Colin’s debrief had gone smoothly and he had nothing new to report, aside from the general anti-American banter that went on at Omar’s cab stand. Big talk and vitriolic rancor meant nothing. Men like Omar ran down America the way Yankees fans ran down the Red Sox. Hicks and Colin had even begun to wonder if they should put Colin on another assignment and return to a more passive surveillance of Omar’s cab stand. Tracing cell phone calls and emails as they came through the grid might suffice.
But the Colin he’d seen under the footbridge just over an hour before was not the Colin he’d known. Whatever had terrified him must have occurred within the past forty-eight hours. The question was why. The answer had to be Omar. So that’s where Hicks was going to begin.
Hicks logged into the system to see if OMNI had been able to make positive identifications of the two men he’d killed. The system was still running identity checks, but Hicks’ instincts told him the two men were Somali. They had that same gaunt, haunted look of the other Somalis that Omar had hired at the cab stand. He knew Omar also thought other Africans were weak and susceptible to corruption from the West which was why he hired mostly his own people. Colin’s cover had been feasible since his parents had been from a region of Kenya on the Somalian border, which Omar deemed acceptable.
Colin had told Hicks that most of Omar’s drivers were sons of farmers; young men who’d gotten to America more out of desperation than Islamic ideology. If going along with Omar’s ranting kept money in their pocket and a roof over their heads, they went along with it. According to Colin, Omar was the only hardcore radical at his stand.
That meant whatever had happened at the cab stand to turn Colin had happened since the debrief. Hicks intended on finding out what.
While OMNI kept searching for identities, Hicks scanned recent email and cell phone intercepts from Omar’s cab company and all of its workers. Many of them bought disposable phones—also called burn phones, believing that would make it harder for agencies to eavesdrop. In some cases, they were right, but most agencies didn’t have the University’s resources. Any phone activated near the garage was immediately tagged and followed for the duration of the phone’s life. Every conversation was transcribed, tracked and recorded by OMNI and deciphered by University programs and human analysts. Most of it was just mundane, every day chatter, but every so often, something valuable turned up.
In reviewing the OMNI reports on all emails, text messages, and conversations from phones that had been near the garage in the past forty-eight hours, Hicks didn’t find anything suspicious, but that was to be expected. OMNI software translated and deciphered all conversations and emails and texts, listening for key phrases and code words and patterns. Nothing out of the ordinary came up, but Hicks ordered OMNI to re-scrub the conversations to see if he could catch anything new about Colin.
Then Hicks took a look at the camera he’d taken from the dead man in the park. He removed the SD card from the camera and placed it in his computer’s drive. After scanning it locally for a virus, he watched the footage from the beginning.
The man had begun filming as soon as Hicks walked into the underpass. The image jerked and went out of focus as the cameraman tried to keep Hicks in frame. Colin looked even more strung out and timid than Hicks had remembered. The footage jerked wildly as the cameraman lost his footing and slipped from where he’d been standing and lead started flying. The camera was still shooting when the cameraman caught a bullet to the head and died.
The last image on the SD card was of
But Hicks knew he hadn’t missed anything. Colin’s debrief had gone smoothly and he had nothing new to report, aside from the general anti-American banter that went on at Omar’s cab stand. Big talk and vitriolic rancor meant nothing. Men like Omar ran down America the way Yankees fans ran down the Red Sox. Hicks and Colin had even begun to wonder if they should put Colin on another assignment and return to a more passive surveillance of Omar’s cab stand. Tracing cell phone calls and emails as they came through the grid might suffice.
But the Colin he’d seen under the footbridge just over an hour before was not the Colin he’d known. Whatever had terrified him must have occurred within the past forty-eight hours. The question was why. The answer had to be Omar. So that’s where Hicks was going to begin.
Hicks logged into the system to see if OMNI had been able to make positive identifications of the two men he’d killed. The system was still running identity checks, but Hicks’ instincts told him the two men were Somali. They had that same gaunt, haunted look of the other Somalis that Omar had hired at the cab stand. He knew Omar also thought other Africans were weak and susceptible to corruption from the West which was why he hired mostly his own people. Colin’s cover had been feasible since his parents had been from a region of Kenya on the Somalian border, which Omar deemed acceptable.
Colin had told Hicks that most of Omar’s drivers were sons of farmers; young men who’d gotten to America more out of desperation than Islamic ideology. If going along with Omar’s ranting kept money in their pocket and a roof over their heads, they went along with it. According to Colin, Omar was the only hardcore radical at his stand.
That meant whatever had happened at the cab stand to turn Colin had happened since the debrief. Hicks intended on finding out what.
While OMNI kept searching for identities, Hicks scanned recent email and cell phone intercepts from Omar’s cab company and all of its workers. Many of them bought disposable phones—also called burn phones, believing that would make it harder for agencies to eavesdrop. In some cases, they were right, but most agencies didn’t have the University’s resources. Any phone activated near the garage was immediately tagged and followed for the duration of the phone’s life. Every conversation was transcribed, tracked and recorded by OMNI and deciphered by University programs and human analysts. Most of it was just mundane, every day chatter, but every so often, something valuable turned up.
In reviewing the OMNI reports on all emails, text messages, and conversations from phones that had been near the garage in the past forty-eight hours, Hicks didn’t find anything suspicious, but that was to be expected. OMNI software translated and deciphered all conversations and emails and texts, listening for key phrases and code words and patterns. Nothing out of the ordinary came up, but Hicks ordered OMNI to re-scrub the conversations to see if he could catch anything new about Colin.
Then Hicks took a look at the camera he’d taken from the dead man in the park. He removed the SD card from the camera and placed it in his computer’s drive. After scanning it locally for a virus, he watched the footage from the beginning.
The man had begun filming as soon as Hicks walked into the underpass. The image jerked and went out of focus as the cameraman tried to keep Hicks in frame. Colin looked even more strung out and timid than Hicks had remembered. The footage jerked wildly as the cameraman lost his footing and slipped from where he’d been standing and lead started flying. The camera was still shooting when the cameraman caught a bullet to the head and died.
The last image on the SD card was of
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