Catalyst (Breakthrough Book 3)(60)

Tang glanced at Clay’s large frame in the small seat. “Get as comfortable as you can. We have a long drive.”

“Feels like my seat on the plane.”

“We’ll gear up outside of Wuhan. You need anything bigger than an AK?”

“I don’t think so. I’m hoping not to be here very long.”

Tang grinned. “That’s what I said six years ago.”

“Well, I don’t think I could pull off your job.”

Tang’s official job was a security guard for a large company contracted with the Chinese government. He was currently, and quite strategically, assigned to the Ministry of Foreign Relations of the People’s Republic of China. Specifically the Department of European and Central Asian Affairs in Guangzhou. However, Tang’s true job was to glean information regarding Russia’s political and economic liaisons with China after the two had recently become increasingly, and surprisingly, close.

Tang’s “ordinary” appearance was intentional as required by the United States’ Central Intelligence Agency. His title of “operative” within the agency was also generic. More simply put, Tang was a U.S. spy.

And even though the security agency he’d been infiltrated into as a cover was far from efficient, they did have some semblance of protocol. He had a maximum of three days before his absence would raise attention.

“I sure hope you have something better than just Beijing soon.”

Clay nodded. “So do I.”





31





In Beijing, Li Qin remained standing in the middle of General Wei’s former dwelling. The apartment was located in the district of Dongcheng, the same district home to The Forbidden City, the Temple of Confucius, and the infamous Tian’anman Square where in 1989 Chinese soldiers opened fire on hundreds of pro-democracy demonstrators. It was the movement that was heard around the world.

Today, Dongcheng was the largest upper-class area of Beijing, housing some of Hebei Province’s wealthiest aristocracy.

Yet as Qin stood in the main living room of the spacious apartment, he was struck by how simply Wei had lived. The light walls, floor to ceiling bookcases, and checkered carpeting were nice and appropriately decorative but of a somewhat simpler taste. Of all the people Qin had investigated from within the Ministry of State Security, Wei was without a doubt the least extravagant.

Xinzhen, the most senior of the Politburo’s Standing Committee, had tasked him with uncovering and understanding Wei’s final actions which led to a surprise revolt against the most powerful men in all of China. At least that was how Xinzhen had described it to Qin, which meant it was most certainly not accurate.

Xinzhen’s reluctance to reveal too much was itself a clue. Never before had Qin been asked to work within such a vacuum of information. He was told to find information that no one had, and to do it with virtually no information to begin with. The great Xinzhen was holding back. And judging from past experience, the more a person held back information, the deeper the scandal went.

Qin moved to the windows of the apartment, where he pulled out his cell phone and calmly dialed.

On the second ring, the call was answered by a young man barely into his twenties with jet-black hair and eyes to match. One of the best computer hackers in all of Eastern China.

Known only as “M0ngol,” his gaunt pale face remained illuminated in the bright and eerie glow of his computer monitor.

China had grown at an astonishing pace for over four centuries, in what many would term “reckless abandon.” And the young man on the other end of Qin’s call was the very personification of that recklessness, now in a new and frightening digital world.

M0ngol was one of the hundreds of sophisticated hackers employed by China’s infamous intelligence ministry, hired in response to the devastating level of spying initiated by the United States’ National Security Agency.

Countries all over the world were first stunned to learn of the NSA’s actions when finally exposed, then immediately driven to thwart what they deemed an invasion of national sovereignty. Both friends and foes rushed to establish their own counter-agencies, and not surprisingly, the one country with the resources needed to go head to head with the United States…was China.

The most populous country in the world had a plethora of exceptionally gifted computer hackers at their disposal, already motivated by curiosity and greed. The only motivator that China’s Ministry of State Security needed to add…was anger.

The world of espionage had changed. Wars were now increasingly being fought on a digital battlefield of electrons. Individual hacking of emails and bank accounts were considered quaint next to nationally funded attacks on other countries. Attacks that were barely imaginable just a few years ago with capabilities that too few were even able to grasp.