Page 44 of Ghost of Talon Mountain
"They'll come. Healy's not the type to let a threat linger."
Healy. Deputy Director Lawrence Healy. The name I planted in our false intel. The man I identified through linguistic analysis as the most likely candidate for Shepherd. Former Army intelligence, served in Iraq during the same period as several known trafficking facilitators. Currently oversees DOJOrganized Crime operations in the Pacific Northwest and Alaska.
The man with access to everything. Case files. Witness protection details. Undercover placements. He could feed the network intel with one hand while directing federal investigations with the other.
The perfect mole.
If I'm right. If the linguistic patterns I identified actually point to him and not some other bilingual fed with Great Lakes roots and intelligence training.
If I'm wrong, we just painted a target on an innocent man and accomplished nothing except our own deaths.
The receiver crackles again. Different this time. Not static. A signal. Weak, but there.
"Chris." My voice comes out sharper than intended. "I've got something."
He's beside me in seconds, rifle slung across his back. Moves like a ghost for someone his size.
I adjust the receiver, fine-tune the frequency. The signal strengthens, resolves into discrete pulses. Encrypted, high-frequency burst transmission. Exactly what we've been waiting for.
"How long to decrypt?" Chris asks.
"Depends on the encryption level. Could be minutes, could be hours." I open the decryption software, set it to work. "But if this is Shepherd responding to our bait, they'll be using the same protocols I've already mapped."
The algorithm runs. Fifteen seconds. Thirty. My shoulder screams in protest as I lean forward, intent on the screen.
There. The encryption breaks. Text resolves from gibberish into readable English interspersed with Russian phrases.
"Alpha team, converge on coordinates. Target is analyst, secondary is witness. Secure all electronic devices. Eliminate both if extraction not viable."
The words hang on the screen, cold and final as a death sentence.
"How long?" Chris asks.
I check the timestamp, cross-reference with known travel times from base camps to this area. "Six hours. Maybe eight if weather slows them."
"That's not enough time to get clear."
"We're not running." I scroll through the transmission data, isolate the voice signature embedded in the header. "We're ending this."
The voice print runs through my database. Comparing phonemes, syntax patterns, regional markers. The analysis takes ninety seconds that feel like hours.
Then the match pops up. 99.7% probability.
Deputy Director Lawrence Healy.
"Got him," I whisper.
Chris leans over my shoulder, reads the identification. His whole body goes rigid. "He sent my team into that ambush. He knew exactly where we'd be, exactly when we'd arrive. Joel and Tate died because of him."
"Then we make sure everyone knows it."
I pull up the evidence package I've been compiling. Voice prints from this transmission and three others I've intercepted. Linguistic analysis showing consistent patterns across five years of trafficking communications. Financial traces linking Healy to offshore accounts. Intercepted messages detailing operations.
Everything. Every piece of proof we need to burn Healy's entire network.
"We need a failsafe," Chris says. "If they take us out?—"
"Already done." I show him the automated upload protocol. "I check in every twelve hours using a secure code. If I miss two check-ins, everything uploads to FBI, DOJ Internal Affairs, and three major media outlets simultaneously."
