Dozens of aircraft were on display — all civil aircraft used in the West — passenger airliners, cargo craft, even research, firefighting, and weather monitoring aircraft were included in the chip’s extensive database.
“What is all this?” asked Jamey Farrell.
“This is all the data I downloaded from the memory stick,” said Doris. “There’s nothing left beyond some random data strains here and there I have yet to decrypt. I’ll continue working on them though; maybe I’ll find something important.”
“What exactly are we looking at?” Milo asked.
“It looks like a pretty thorough civil aircraft registry,” said Tony.
“Real thorough,” said Doris. “This software can recognize dozens of specific types of European, American, and Japanese aircraft by profile and heat signature, IFF frequencies, radio frequencies, you name it. And there’s even a program to compress and download the necessary data into some other system which interfaces with the memory stick through the USB port—”
“That would be the computer guidance system inside the anti-aircraft missile itself,” said Captain Schneider. “Once programmed and fired, the missile can guide itself to the target with the data downloaded from the memory stick.”
Nina’s face was tight with tension. “With this device at their disposal, terrorists could pinpoint and down any aircraft they wanted to. They—”
Captain Schneider raised her hand. “Not quite,” she interrupted. “The effective range of a shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missile is very limited. A civil aircraft at its normal cruising altitude would probably not be at risk. A target aircraft would have to be flying at a fairly low altitude — as it is when it takes off or lands — for a Long Tooth missile to be truly effective.”
“That explains why the terrorists were at the airport,” said Tony. “They wanted to maximize their chance for success.”
“But it doesn’t explain their choice of target,” Nina replied. “There was absolutely nothing aboard the cargo aircraft Dante Arete’s gang was aiming at to warrant a shoot-down. It was a standard, cargo-configured 727 packed with overnight mail and packages. The cargo was checked after landing and cleared by National Transportation Safety Board screeners under our supervision.”
“Maybe the shoot-down was supposed to be symbolic. Maybe the terrorists wanted to send a message,” said Jamey.
“Or maybe it was a test,” said Tony. “Maybe they wanted to see if the target recognition system really worked as advertised before they went after their real target.”
Nina tucked strands of her short black hair behind an ear. “Whatever Dante Arete’s goal, we know that with this technology, he and his accomplices have the ability to target specific aircraft, even in the crowded skies over a busy airport.”
Nina faced Captain Schneider. “I’m turning the actual memory stick over to you next. Take it apart and put it back together, reverse-engineer the thing, trace each individual component to the original manufacturer or melt them down to their base minerals. I want you to do whatever it takes to find out where this device was made and where the maker got the parts.”
Captain Schneider detached the memory stick from the data port it had been plugged into. She placed the device inside a static-free Mylar envelope and headed back to the Cyber Unit.
When she was gone, Tony confronted Nina.
“What are you doing giving Captain Schneider a spot on the Crisis Team? She’s not an agent; she’s a computer engineer. Captain Schneider doesn’t have any field experience and she isn’t even a member of CTU.”
“We needed her expertise,” Nina replied, still staring over Doris’s shoulder at the images crawling across the HDTV screen.
Tony shook his head. “I don’t accept your explanation. What does Chappelle have to say about all this?”
Nina rose to her full height, faced Tony Almeida. “Ryan Chappelle is on a conference call to Washington. He’s working to control the damage, which is pretty important right now. That means he has no time to monitor the Crisis Team, so he left that task to me. In case you’ve forgotten, Jack left me in charge, too, so I’m handling the situation. My way.”
Georgi Timko cradled his friend’s head in his bloodstained hands. Jack ripped away the ragged flannel shirt to check the downed man’s wounds. Jack could see the man had taken three shots — to the chest, the shoulder, the abdomen. The shoulder wound was not life-threatening. It was impossible to tell how bad the abdominal wound was, but the largest injury was a sucking chest wound. When Jack tried to plug the hole and allow him to breathe, the man gasped, choked on the blood that shot up from his flooded lung and flowed from his mouth.
The man was doomed and Jack knew it. But at the behest of the heavy-set man, whose piercing gray eyes both commanded and pleaded, Jack went to work, applying every first aid skill he’d acquired in fifteen-plus years of service in the Army, and later in the elite, anti-terrorist organization Delta Force. Jack managed to staunch the flow of blood, but the wounded man’s eyes glazed over.
“Alexi, stay with me,” Timko urged, shaking him.
“We have to move him,” said Jack.
Together they lifted the man and placed him on a table.
“I need more light.”
Timko ducked behind the bar and returned with a battery-operated lantern. Jack carefully rolled the man on his side to check for exit wounds. There were two. One, as large as a tennis ball, had taken out part of the man’s spine.
The man on the table gasped in distress, opened his eyes, and thrashed about on the table. Despite his wounds, he fought with great strength.
“Alexi, Alexi! Keep looking at me. Stay with us,” Timko urged.
He calmed when he saw Timko bending over him. Alexi coughed, then slumped back onto the blood-soaked table.
“I’m here, Alexi,” Timko assured him, his eyes damp as he took the man’s hand and squeezed it.
Alexi looked up at Timko and managed a smile. He closed his eyes and muttered in Russian. “I can hear the helicopter. They will be here soon to take me away…”
A minute later, Alexi was gone.
“I’m sorry,” Jack said quietly.
Timko nodded as a tear escaped his eye, lost its way in the stubble of his unshaven cheek. “Alexi was a decent man…for a Russian pig.”
Jack studied the dead man’s naked hide, crisscrossed with old scars. Someone had used a knife to inflict deep wounds that had shredded the flesh on his abdomen and chest. Jack knew that type of cut was meant to cause the most agony a human could endure. He looked up, met the heavy-set man’s stare with his own.
“This man. He fought in Afghanistan,” said Jack.
Georgi looked away. “Don’t be absurd.”
“Scars don’t lie,” Jack replied. “This man was tortured by the mujahideen.”
“Who are you? What do you want from me?”
“My name is Jack Bauer. I’m not from around here. I’m in town for a job. I came right here from the airport because I was supposed to meet an associate—”
Timko snorted. “Now who is lying, Mr. Jack Bauer? Before I came to America, I was trained in the most difficult school in the world — the criminal underground in the former Soviet Union. I learned one thing while outsmarting the Communist enforcers. I learned to recognize the stench of police, no matter his country of origin.”
Timko sniffed the air theatrically. “You, Mr. Jack Bauer, have a very strong odor.”
A gun barrel dug into Jack’s ribs. He turned to find a toothless old man pointing an Uzi at him.
“Meet my friend, Yuri. Do not let his looks deceive you. Yuri understands no English but he knows trouble when he sees it and can kill a dozen different ways.”