“How did you run a trace on it?” Noble scowled at Max. “Did you hack the DOD again?”
“Umm…”
Noble swatted Max on the back of the head. “You are gonna get arrested one of these days and I’m gonna be visiting you in Leavenworth.”
“Hey, where is everyone?” a voice called from somewhere in the house.
“Noah,” Drax jumped out of his chair and disappeared out of the war-room, his wide smile telling them all he was happy as a pig in muck that his man was back.
“Noah is his partner,” Saxon explained to Rick. “He works for an international organization that functions as a network of criminal law enforcement agencies from different countries.”
“Ah,” Rick could guess at which one and probably be right, there were only so many organizations who had access to everything across the globe. “He’s the dude who sent us intel yesterday?”
“Yup.”
“Boss,” Drax pushed into the war-room. He held the door to allow the other man to follow him in, then shut it behind them. “Noah has info.”
* * *
“Hey guys.”Noah dropped a briefcase on the floor beside a chair in front of a computer.
Rick studied the man who’d come into the war-room with Drax. It didn’t take a genius to see that these two were connected. They moved in sync as they walked. Drax’s possessive hand on the other man’s back told its own story. By the round of greetings from the other Red Squadron team members, he could see this man was very much part of the family.
“What did you find?” Noble waited until everyone was settled before he drew them all back to attention. “We’re spinning wheels here.”
“Look at this from the other side,” Noah went about setting up at the computer near Max.
“Explain.”
Noah didn’t look at Noble while he continued setting up. “Some of the chatter the analysts are seeing in Interpol has flagged Diego Garcia as a target for a civilian drone attack. This is a long time in the planning.” He jerked his chin toward the screens and asked Max, “May I?”
“Go ahead.”
Noah hit the keys and started sending intel to the screens. “Late last year we started seeing chatter about a plan for a 9/11-style attack on a military base in the Indian Ocean.”
“That’s probably what we were looking at since we rescued Shaun,” Zenko said.
“Yup. Twice, that particular plot has been stopped,” Max agreed. “It’s like fucking whack-a-mole, we take out one bunch of tangos and the fuckers keep trying other methods.”
“We found evidence that points to someone within the government being involved.” Noble tilted his head to read the information Noah was sending to the screen. “But nothing we can point to, to say this man or that.”
“Yup,” Noah laid out his pens, side by side like soldiers. “After Zenko pulled Shaun out of Afghanistan and the shitshow the went down in the aftermath, Interpol started picking up chatter in some of the forums they monitor for mafia activity that the Taliban were looking for drones. Specifically, civilian drones with a long-distance range, and they wanted to buy them from a civilian organization.”
“I don’t get it,” Luc stood next to Roman with one boot planted against the wall behind them. “They want to use drones for what? Surveillance?”
“Most recent chatter is shopping lists for materials needed to make IEDS.”
“Fuck.” The wheels turned in Saxon’s head. As the team’s bomb disposal guy, he could already see the potential. “People already use drones to carry cameras, and surveillance shit, it would be easy to add a small bomb and send it somewhere.”
“A small bomb on a drone isn’t going to do much damage to a Navy Base,” Noble muttered, “Or even a ship, that can’t be it.”
“You’re thinking too small. But you are also kinda right. A single drone won’t do much damage,” Noah pulled up some transcripts of the chatter Interpol had been monitoring, and sent them to the screens. “But…”
“A swarm of them would.” Saxon squeezed his eyes shut. While he could probably disarm a bomb or two, three at a push. A swarm of them was too much boom, even for him.
“Yup.” Noah highlighted a couple of lines on the screen. “Scratch the 9/11 plot and enter from stage left, the Pearl Harbor one, but the advanced, upgraded model.”
“Balls.” Shaun scrubbed his hand down over his face. “How the fuck do we stop a swarm of drones from dropping a payload on Diego Garcia?”
