European Intelligence Bureau
Operation Myrmidon - Christopher Liberius (Recurring Character)
0010 Moscow Time
April 23 2004
"What we need is a plan of action!" yelled Francois Duval as he sat in the corner chair with his dress pants and white shirt. It was a fine complement to his greased back, black hair and blue eyes. As far as anyone else could tell though, he was fresh out of the Intelligence Academy. He looked around the dimly light room, it's curtains pulled shut to hide from the faint aura of lights from the streets of Moscow. The room itself was just as sad and depressing as could be expected of a safe house on the doorstep of the enemy. The carpet was a haggard beige and the wall was adorned in a faded brown paint, pulling itself back and off the rough Russian craftsmanship.
Christopher stared back at him, and waited for Arthur's response. It came with the usual gusto. "This is Moscow, not some back end town in the Caucasus! We can't just go crashing into government offices and walk back out and across the border! What you're suggesting is insane!"
"We can't just sit here and let them play with the Union! We can't let them pull off another bombing or another proxy war to weaken Europe." Francois said, reiterating his point made a thousand times before.
"And we can't take forceful action against the FSB or the GRU without destroying years of work to get us here! It would do more harm than good." Christopher interjected.
"But we need more information. If this Pale Khan is connected to the Omega Cell, then we have to find him, capture him, and then debrief him." said Pavel Koslov. Pavel, himself a Russian turncoat serving as Secretary to the Minister of Defence, was one of the oldest of the group. He had been involved with European Intelligence since before the Summer War, feeding West German Intelligence every scrap of information he could get, although then it had been hardly noticeable. "And besides, I doubt that we'll get much more information from their bank books." He said, glancing one of his brown eyes at Christopher as a strand of brown hair fell down beside his face.
"Their bank book was the first scrap of information we've had on this subject in months. We're lucky I managed to get the information I did. Things are getting worse at their building every day. The more I ask to have access to their secure files, the more they expect me to save them money. It won't be long before they get suspicious, if I have to keep this up." Christopher fired back.
"And it's not like Ratzel to tell his men to hold back." Koslov conceded, adjusting the brown leather jacket over his burgundy sweater as he leaned back in the chair.
"Either way, it doesn't change anything. We still can't make a move against them. Not of that size." Arthur said, leaning back against the wall in his khaki pants and grey t-shirt. He brought his hand up to his forehead. Christopher wondered for a moment if the stress was getting to him. There was a reason that Cell Chiefs were rotated annually, if not sooner.
"It wouldn't do us any good if we did launch a raid anyway. We'd be dead in 6 hours, and the Omega Cell isn't in Russia." Christopher said.
"What makes you think that?" Francois pressed.
"The Omega Cell is mobile. It has to be. It's one of the reasons we can't find it. I wonder if the Russians even know where it is half the time."
"That's only guesswork." Arthur refuted.
"If the Omega Cell is mobile, then why wouldn't they be here? In Russia, I mean? The country's big enough to lose yourself in a day." Koslov asked.
"I don't know why, but most of their monetary exchanges with the GRU are converted currency." Christopher responded.
"Converted from what?" Koslov pressed.
"I don't know. It wasn't recorded."
"But if they're setting up safe houses in the Middle East and Africa, well that's got to be a clue right?"
"It's possible." Arthur conceded.
"Possible?"
"Russia has mostly kept funding limited to Western Europe, South America and her two biggest rivals, China and the United States. An expansion in Africa and the Middle East could just mean that they're branching out."
"And it would help to explain their budget increase." Christopher added.
"Building a network and setting up half a dozen safe houses doesn't double the budget of the GRU." Koslov said in disbelief.
"If you're just expanding, wouldn't you improve your existing networks rather than create new ones?" Francois questioned.
"Look, the point is that we don't know anything for sure. This is all conjecture, and either way we still can't get to that information." Arthur said.
"What about the Philippines? If the Pale Khan goes around stirring up trouble, then couldn't he be a part of that?"
"What interest does Russia have in the Philippines?" Arthur mocked.
"If we go by that logic, then he's been to Libya and Indonesia lately, and the Russian's have deeper pockets than we thought." Koslov countered.
"The only thing that's clear is that a raid on the GRU is suicide. Even a night raid would get us all killed." Christopher said.
"Ratzel wouldn't approve it anyway. There would be too much at stake if things went wrong, which they would." Arthur concluded.
"What if we didn't raid the GRU?" Francois asked, looking up from his moment of contemplation.
"That's exactly what we're discussing." Koslov sighed.
"No, I mean if WE didn't raid the GRU? What if someone else raided them?"
"Where are you-"
"Hold on Koslov, let him speak." Christopher said, bracing himself against the table in front of himself.
"If we raid the GRU, then it's an act of war and we're all dead men, right? Well what if the GRU was implicated in a plot against Russia? A plot that the FSB got wind of?"
"How do we implicate the GRU in a plot against Russia?" Arthur scoffed. Koslov stared at the others in disbelief.
"This is mad, even for you Europeans." He said, half jokingly.
"I can do it." Christopher whispered, before the hail of questions from around the room.
"You what?"
"You can?"
"You're mad."
"Think about it" he began, "I have some access to the GRU's funds and data records. If I can get access to their classified information, then I can change it."
"You'd need the codes to do that." Arthur interrupted.
"They don't have codes." Koslov said.
"What? Everyone has codes." Francois scoffed.
"Not us Russians. Your numerical codes originated in the West. Some of them during the Cold War, and some of them before that. Either way, it still puts Russia at odds with your system. The Russians use an algorithm to generate a password specific to each day of the year, that is never repeated, and never needs to be recorded. It's an ingenious system."
"So you know the algorithm?" Francois asked.
"Not at all." he laughed. "I just know what the Minister of Defence tells me."
There was a silence in the room for some time as each man thought his way through the obstacles and the possibilities of such a dangerous and daunting task. They had to find an algorithm that was nigh intelligible, to get a code that was nigh indecipherable, to implicate an organization that was nigh untouchable.
"So our plan's already dead in the water." Arthur sighed.
"No. Not so long as we can get that Algorithm. If we get that, then we can get the code. If we get the code-" Christopher trailed off.
"Then the FSB raids the GRU?" Francois asked.
"And we find the Omega Cell." Koslov said, raising his hands with palms up momentarily, before letting them fall back at his side.
"But we have to get the Algorithm. That's what we're saying, isn't it?" Arthur asked, looking at Christopher, his arms locked into place on the table as he ran through it in his head. "And not only that, it means that you have to be with the FSB teams." He added, pointing a finger at Francois.
"Me? Why?"
"You're our only contact in the FSB. We need you in the operation to make sure we get what we need."
"Then I need to be in the operation as well." Christopher said, pushing himself back from the table, to look up at Arthur. "If Francois goes in with the FSB alone, then he isn't going to know what he's looking for."
"So we tell him what to look for." Koslov answered.
"No, it's not like pulling a folder marked 'Omega Cell' out of a drawer, or a filing cabinet. It's in the encrypted system, and that means that there are going to be hundreds, if not thousands of files just like it in an electronic database. He'd have to download them all to make sure he got it, and we don't have time to sort through that." He paused momentarily. "I know it adds a measure of risk to the operation but-"
"A measure? a measure?" Do you know how bloody insane that is? We make a plot for the FSB to storm the headquarters of the GRU, and assuming we manage to get to the stage where they kick down the door and arrest each other, and not us, you want to throw yourself into the mix?!" Arthur screamed.
"This is absolutely insane." Koslov reiterated.
"If Francois is the one who arrests me, then we have nothing to worry about. Besides, I'm the only one who can get to the room before the FSB kick down the door, and I know the system. None of you have any idea what it's like." Christopher said, hiding his own reservations about the task. It was absolutely insane.
"That is one giant fucking 'if'." Francois cursed.
"Ratzel isn't going to like this at all."
"Then don't tell him." Koslov suggested. "If we don't get the information, then we'll never find the Omega Cell. We have to get that information."
"But the risk of-" Arthur was interrupted as Koslov started up again.
"The best scenario is that we all come out of this alive, and then go to your Union and part ways, where we settle down on government salaries and relax for the rest of our lives. The worst scenario is that we're all dead by the end of this, and if that happens, well, it's not our problem anymore."
The four men considered his words carefully.
"I'll send a request to the EIB for information on the Russian algorithm system. If they don't have anything, then we'll all have to find out what we can. In the meantime, Koslov and I will begin working to implicate members of the government. I can get to the Ambassador to Britain, and he can get to some of the more nationalist generals in the company of the Minister of Defence. Francois, you can start checking FSB files on the GRU and members of the government for those that the FSB is concerned about. We'll put together a list of conspirators and then you have to tie them all to the GRU, without implicating the entire organization. We want the Pale Horse and the Omega Cell intact at the end of this." Arthur said harshly, looking square into Christopher's eyes.
"Consider the GRU a traitor's coven." He said, smiling through the reflection of his coffin in Arthur's eyes.
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