After Snowden, the director had Aerial reengineer all the God’s Eye security protocols. In retrospect, Perkins knew, that was the moment to go public with the information if she was ever going to. But Aerial said the new protocols wouldn’t prevent her from creating a new backdoor, so she would be able to continue to gather the proof she needed. Perkins didn’t push. In fact, he secretly hoped she would continue to use her need for more proof as a kind of excuse to not act.
The night she finished architecting the new system, she was supposed to meet Perkins at a hotel near Baltimore/Washington International Airport. But she never showed up. Perkins, guessing something had come up at home and that she couldn’t contact him about it in real time, was no more than disappointed. But the next morning, it was all over the news: area woman raped and murdered.
Initially, his denial had been so profound that he’d actually believed the reports. Aerial’s body had been found behind a strip mall in Laurel. Her car was in the parking lot of her gym, which made sense — if you could call it that — because her habit was to do an abbreviated workout before meeting Perkins so she could be seen at the gym and have a kind of alibi. The police had speculated that she’d been forced into a car or van and driven to a secondary location. The footage from nearby traffic cameras had been scrutinized, to no avail. Semen was recovered, and matched what had been found in five similar attacks. The same serial rapist who had struck up and down the I-95 corridor over the last several years.
But eventually, denial had given way to doubt, doubt to determination. What better way to guarantee the integrity of the new security protocols than to kill the very person who had designed them? Hadn’t the pharaohs done just that with the architects of the pyramids, the better to ensure that no one unauthorized could ever discover their riches? And what were the chances of a “random” murder mere hours after her redesign went live?
He’d been initially terrified that whoever had killed Aerial would come after him next, knowing they had been lovers, seeking to tie off all loose ends. But then he realized — if they had known, he would have been dead already. He was safe. He and Aerial had been careful. Maybe not as careful as they should have been, in retrospect, but careful enough, thank God.
Six months after Aerial had died, Perkins was moved to Ankara. It was a scheduled posting, and he’d been fighting it so he could remain at Fort Meade with Aerial. But now it was an excuse to be away from his family, to not have to hide his grief from the people around him.
For a long time, he steered clear of Aerial’s archived files, superstitiously afraid that going to the site she had established would somehow render him a target. But eventually, his rage at what had been done to her, his determination to do right by her, and his caustic shame at his own cowardice impelled him to act. The backdoor was closed, and he didn’t know whatever new one she had established. But her trove of explosive files was intact. He considered anonymously uploading everything to multiple news sources, but then decided that in the end, he would be safer, and the release more effective, if he could find the right journalist to use as a conduit. Gellman, Greenwald, Poitras… all were obvious choices, but they’d already made their bones and had gone on to other journalistic endeavors. Assange had been bottled up by the UK government, with WikiLeaks successfully positioned in the public mind as some sort of reckless espionage outfit. He wanted someone with courage and integrity, but with an organization the government hadn’t yet managed to vilify with propaganda. A young Intercept reporter would make sense — the Greenwald-Poitras lineage, and an outfit with the right reputation and resources. There were several possibilities, but he had settled on Hamilton because the kid had a computer science background that would enable him to understand the material and equip him to keep it safe.
God, he hoped he’d made the right choice. For himself. And for Aerial, too.
He stood and filed off the bus with everyone else, a few fat drops of rain spattering on his head and shoulders as he ducked under the overhang. It was unseasonably cold, and between that and the wet he was suddenly shivering.
He pushed through the crowds, found a restroom inside, and took a long, much-needed piss. As he shook off, he told himself again it was okay, the worst of the danger had passed. Still, he was afraid, badly afraid, of what would happen to him if he were caught. Chelsea Manning had been kept naked in solitary for almost a year and awakened every five minutes by guards to check that she was “okay.” And Snowden… Christ, he couldn’t imagine what they would do if they ever got their hands on him. But no matter what, at least now, the program he’d uncovered would be public. At least whatever might happen to him if he were caught wouldn’t be for nothing.
He headed back into the station, the noise of the bustling crowds and arrival and departure announcements headache-loud against the granite floor and high, vaulted ceilings. He realized he was starving, and stopped at a kiosk for a coffee and sandwich. He watched while the barista mixed and then heated the coffee powder, sugar, and water in a cezve, eager for the jolt the strong Turkish brew would provide, but glad the young man was taking the time to prepare it properly, heating it slowly, ready to pour it carefully down the side of a waiting demitasse the moment the coffee came to a boil. After that, it would need to sit for a few moments so the grounds could settle. He smiled, thinking that whatever happened next, he would miss Turkish coffee.
CNN International was playing on a television monitor mounted on the wall at the back of the kiosk. The White House spokesman was disputing Yemeni claims that a drone strike had killed twelve members of a wedding party. The spokesman was explaining, “There must be near certainty that no civilians will be killed or injured — the highest standard we can set,” and claimed the victims were “militants.” Perkins shook his head disgustedly at the lies, tired of it, tired of it all.
The chyron changed to Breaking News and a blow-dried talking head came on. “This just in,” the talking head recited in the grave tones of a trained news actor. “An American journalist is feared kidnapped by ISIS.”
Perkins watched, thinking it was going to be a busy day and that he’d gotten back just in time to avoid being missed. And then the announcer went on. “Intercept reporter Ryan Hamilton was apparently vacationing in Turkey when he disappeared somewhere near the Syrian border. Authorities fear the young man may have gotten too close to trafficking routes used by ISIS and related terrorist groups, perhaps hoping to cover a topic that has proven a source of contention between Ankara and the White House.”
Perkins felt the blood drain from his face. He’d left Hamilton not six hours earlier, in Istanbul, nowhere near the Syrian border. What the fuck was this about? Was he blown?
He dropped twenty lira on the counter and hurried through the terminal to the taxi stand. He had a backup phone and was desperate to turn it on, but didn’t want to risk it until he was away from the terminal. Because how the hell would he explain what he was doing at the bus station? He was supposed to have driven to Cappadocia, and yes, he’d already prepared cover for action in case he was spotted doing anything inconsistent, but he didn’t want to have his story tested, not ever, and especially not now.
The line for taxis was monumental. Everyone seemed to have an umbrella but him. He hunched his shoulders against the rain and tried to think.