The Ethan Galaal Series: Books 1 - 3 Page 5

  "I'm really looking forward to that," William said sarcastically.

  "What about your MacBook?" Ethan nodded at the laptop. "Will they confiscate it?"

  "They might, but I doubt it. They usually let the foreign fighters keep their laptops and phones, though I'd be careful to delete any music, movies or photos. The muj sometimes get special treatment in regards to what sorts of media they're allowed on their devices, but best not to risk it."

  "So, when we use the local Internet services to keep in touch with Sam," Ethan said. "I'm assuming we'll have a way to encrypt our traffic?"

  "Of course." Aaron retrieved an envelope from his backpack and dumped three USB sticks on the table.

  "Amn al-Mujahid?" Ethan said, guessing at the contents of the USBs. That stood for "The Mujahid's Security."

  "Yup. Latest windows revision."

  The Al-Fajr Technical Committee was established by jihadis in September 2012. Affiliated with Al Qaeda, the group produced encryption software to help mujahadeen communicate "safely and effectively." The latest incarnations of the software could be installed on Windows desktops or Android phones and used to send and receive encrypted emails, texts, videos, and so forth. The nice thing about running the same software other jihadis did was that if the sticks were confiscated, no one would think twice about the contents—he loved the irony of using their own tools against them.

  "There's also software included on the USB to remove any stealth key loggers or screen recorders," Aaron continued. "And any other tracking malware the Islamic State or cafe owners may have installed on their computers. Plus, there's a little goodie called readme.txt.exe you may be familiar with."

  "Regin?"

  Aaron nodded.

  Ethan had used that specific malware before. All Windows computers were set to hide file extensions by default, so that particular executable would appear as readme.txt, a text file. Most people clicked on text files named readme without thinking, and once that nasty file was clicked, it would infect the target computer with a modular cyberespionage tool known as Regin, developed and maintained by two full-time teams working for the NSA and MI6.

  Remote operators could tailor the software to specific targets in real-time, as long as the target system had a working Internet connection. It could capture screenshots, take control of the mouse and keyboard, log keystrokes and passwords, monitor web activity, retrieve deleted files, and so forth. Regin made use of several state-of-the-art stealth techniques to stay under the radar, such as encrypted virtual file system containers and payloads, and it had the ability to infect and store parts of itself on other machines in the same network. It could even embed itself in the firmware of certain commercial hard drive brands. It also had an auto-update feature, facilitating long-term intelligence gathering—it's ever-evolving footprint allowed it to continually evade virus scanners.

  "Check it out." Aaron indicated a collapsible button on the topside of the USB that blended seamlessly with the black surface. "A hidden button that saves your current GPS location to a custom folder on the stick for later retrieval. Also includes a mini Laser Target Locater Module. Hold down the button and after a second it emits a visible spectrum laser. Use it like a laser pointer to identify any nearby target you want to acquire—hold it steady, and the built-in laser range finder will compute the GPS coordinates of the target and record them."

  "And who says we never get James Bond stuff?" William said.

  Ethan shrugged. "Repurposed cellphone technology."

  "Well, there's more," Aaron said.

  "Don't keep me in suspense," Ethan mocked.

  Aaron winked. "Squeeze the middle like this." He pinched the center portion. "And yank the top." He pulled the tip: the end telescoped outward. "And it becomes an RF antenna. When we connect it to our phones with the built-in adapter, we can use it to send encrypted texts and voice messages among ourselves, or any other agency embeds within typical RF radii—around one mile in cities, or up to fifty miles if we're standing on top of a mountain. Very useful for the areas of little to no cellular coverage we'll be working in."

  "That's great and everything," Ethan said. "But tell me how this is better than a two-way radio?"

  "Well, it's a lot less obvious, for one. Very under the radar. We come in carrying something like a military-grade PRC-153, that's going to scream 'spy' to the muj. Anyway, here, give me your phone and I'll install the app for the antenna. I'll also pop in the mobile version of Amn al-Mujahid and the other stuff we'll need to stay in touch with Sam, since I'm assuming you wiped your cell before landing."

  Aaron opened up his laptop and Ethan handed him his smartphone.

  While the other operative worked, Ethan examined the USB. He held it to eye level and depressed the laser. Sure enough, a small red dot appeared on the far wall. "This is great and all that, but you know it's useless for long range targets, right?"

  "That's why we have these," Aaron said, producing a small, binocular-like object from the backpack.

  Ethan regarded the item dubiously. "Looks like a hobbyist-grade range finder. Something a golfer might use."

  "More like a surveyor. It's the TruPulse 360 R laser range finder, except we've replaced the laser with a Class 4 to boost the range, and added in an anti-reflective coating to the lenses for glint reduction. Basically a GVS-5 in a consumer shell. It sends its data to the phone via Blueteeth and—"

  "Bluetooth," William corrected. "Really grates on the nerves when people mispronounce common words." He spoke it mis-prah-nance with his Texan drawl.

  Aaron cleared his throat. "As I was saying, it sends the data to an app I'm installing on your smartphone that determines the altitude, latitude and longitude of the target via GPS."

  "Well if we're going to carry these, why not just go with a LLDR 2H?" William said. That stood for the Lightweight Laser Designator Rangefinder, the compact 2H model, also known as AN/PED-1A.

  "You shitting me?" Aaron said. "That's just as bad as bringing military radios. Worse. We carry US Army target designators into the Islamic State, you can bet they'll take them away, then schedule our heads for the chopping block."

  "Point taken," William said. "But what's stopping them from taking away this surveyor crap, too?"

  "Nothing. But other foreign jihadis have successfully brought in golf and sports range finders, so we should be fine. Oh." Aaron grabbed a small leather case from the pack. "Also got this for you."

  Aaron handed the item to Ethan and returned his attention to the laptop.

  Inside the leather holder was the lockpick set Ethan had requested from Sam. He perused the selection of picks and bump keys. It would suit his purposes, and was low tech enough that the Islamic State definitely wouldn't bother him about it.

  "Sam told me you'd brief us on the plan to get into Syria," Ethan said. "So what's the deal? We simply drive across the border and swear allegiance to the Islamic State?"

  "Pretty much. I've been in touch with a people smuggler. He'll get us into Syria and drop us off at an IS checkpoint."

  "Where'd you find him?"

  "IS is very active on social media. I sent a text to a public Kik Messenger account, saying we were three men on hegira to Shaam." Syria.

  "You're sure the account wasn't an NSA honeypot?" Ethan interrupted. The NSA and other intelligence agencies often created fake Islamic State accounts and posted contact information in an effort to catch foreign jihadists.

  Aaron shrugged. "I passed the account Sam's way first, and she confirmed it wasn't NSA. But as I was saying, I messaged the dude and asked how we could join our brothers, and he returned the phone numbers of three local smugglers. So I called one and set us up. By the way, we're not supposed to dress too traditionally during the crossing. We draw less attention that way."

  "What about weapons?" Ethan said, glancing at Aaron's backpack.

  "Not allowed."

  "What do you mean? Not even pistols?"

  "We won't get through if we bring weapons of any k
ind," Aaron said. "According to the recruiter, IS will provide assault rifles anyway."

  "Assault rifles?" William asked suspiciously. "What kind of assault rifles?"

  "AK-47s."

  William threw up his hands. "I'm so sick of those damn things. I've never fired a more inaccurate rifle in my life. I'll take an M16 any day of the week over an AK."

  Aaron shrugged. "Hey, we're clandestine operatives now, not the pampered spec-ops soldiers we once were." He returned Ethan's smartphone.

  "You never know how good you have it until you give it up," William bemoaned.

  Ethan unlocked the phone, navigated to Apps, and swiped to the last screen. He saw the green, flamelike icon for Amn al-Mujahid but nothing else. The icons for the other new apps would be hidden, he knew.

  Aaron showed him how to use the hidden apps.

  "That leaves only one more question," Ethan said when they were done. He snatched the greasy bag from the table but it proved empty. "When do we get more baklavas?"

  7

  Aaron called the people smuggler shortly thereafter and arranged for transport early the next morning. Ethan spent the rest of that day exploring Gaziantep and eating the baklavas and pistachios the city was famous for. He slept well that night, the last good rest he would have for quite a while, and at five a.m. checked out.

  Like him, the other operatives were dressed in a T-shirt and jeans, with their keffiyehs stowed away. For Ethan, it was odd removing the headgear after all that time, and he felt almost naked without it. But the goal was to look like an ordinary Syrian or Turk at the border crossing, so the keffiyeh had to go.

  It was still dark out when a brand new supermini Renault Clio pulled into the loading area.

  "That's our ride," Aaron said.

  "Apparently smuggling pays off," William said.

  "If you knew how much I paid the man," Aaron grinned. "You'd quickly realize we were in the wrong business."

  A Turk got out, introducing himself as Maaz. He opened the Renault's rear hatch and the three of them stowed their backpacks inside.

  "Take these." Maaz distributed three travel documents.

  Ethan accepted his. It was a Syrian passport. He opened to the photo page. The same picture he had on his Saudi passport was on it, though the keffiyeh had been edited out.

  "Come here." Ethan angrily led Aaron away from the others. When he was out of earshot, he said, "You gave this man my photo?"

  Aaron shrugged. "He needed it to make the passports."

  "I don't want my picture in some terrorist computer network."

  Aaron shook his head. "These smugglers are disorganized as hell. Your picture won't be showing up on any terrorist networks anytime soon, trust me."

  Ethan was about to argue his point, but he let it go. Aaron was probably right.

  "Besides, he's just a people smuggler," Aaron continued. "Only loosely related to the Islamic State."

  "Yeah? Bet he's on the White House kill list somewhere."

  "Probably."

  Ethan returned to the vehicle and sat in the cramped passenger seat, nearly banging his head on the upper frame of the door in the process. William and Aaron took the backseats and the journey south began.

  "Where are you from?" Maaz said in a colloquial, difficult to understand Arabic.

  "Saudi Arabia," Ethan answered.

  Maaz nodded. "You will love it in Shaam."

  "You live there?" Ethan said.

  The smuggler chuckled. "No. My calling is here, in Turkey. To help men like you make their hegira. I am too old for the Caliphate."

  "You can't be more than forty," Ethan said.

  "My point exactly. They need young men. Men who can fight. All the administrative positions are already filled." He glanced at Ethan askance. "You are twenty-nine? Thirty?"

  "Twenty-eight," Ethan lied.

  "A good age." Maaz drove on in silence. A moment later: "You have brought weapons?"

  Ethan shook his head. "We were told not too."

  "Good. You will be given weapons in the Caliphate. Along with room and board. And a salary, of course."

  "What about wives?" Aaron said hopefully. From his tone, Ethan thought he was only half joking.

  "Oh yes, if that is what you want, you will all get wives." Features brightening, Maaz glanced at Aaron in the rearview mirror. "Beautiful wives. There are plenty of women to be had. Dawlah will provide." That mean the State.

  "Foreign wives?" Aaron said.

  Maaz pressed his lips together. "Perhaps. There are many foreign women in the Caliphate. I have smuggled women from Pakistan. Afghanistan. France and Britain even."

  The sun rose, and soon the streets of Gaziantep were behind them, replaced by pistachio farms. The verdure gave way to the dry steppe where only the occasional bushes clung to life amid the bedrock. Once in a while a decrepit village passed into view: rusting machinery, concrete houses clustered around a small mosque, grubby, half-naked children.

  A Turkish checkpoint blocked the highway shortly, but the police officer waved them through. According to Maaz the police were stopping only pickup trucks and semis that day. Looking for oil smugglers who fed the Islamic State war machine.

  In forty-five minutes they reached the city of Kilis, close to the Turkey-Syria border. In another ten minutes they were at the Oncupinar border gate, a steel trellis supporting an arched metal canopy over the highway. Flanking it, barbed wire fencing spanned the border from horizon to horizon.

  Maaz bribed the Turkish gendarmerie border guard with the equivalent of ten US dollars and they were on their way. On the Syrian side they were stopped almost immediately by armed men standing in front of an old eight-wheeled Soviet BTR-60 armored personnel carrier.

  "Free Syrian Army checkpoint," Maaz said underbreath.

  One of the guards approached the driver-side door. He carried an RPD light machine gun slung over one shoulder.

  Maaz rolled down the window.

  "Passports?" the guard said.

  Maaz collected the Syrian passports and handed them to the guard, who opened the documents to the photo pages in turn, checking that the faces matched.

  "Do you have any weapons?" the guard said.

  Maaz shook his head.

  The guarded leaned forward, as if scanning the area between seats for hidden arms, then he surveyed the occupants once more. "Where are you going?"

  "Family," Maaz said. "Aleppo."

  The guard handed the passports back to the driver, then furrowed his brow. "Haven't I seen you before?"

  Maaz shrugged. "It's possible. I have a big family."

  The guard hesitated and then finally waved them on.

  Maaz drove through. Glancing in the rear-view mirror, he laughed softly. "Idiots," he said smugly. "I've seen that one at least five times. Others even more often. They always let me pass."

  Maaz drove for about ten minutes and then veered onto an unmarked dirt road, heading east. Fifteen minutes later he turned south onto another paved highway and floored the accelerator.

  "Must be quick here," Maaz said. "In case they're following!"

  Ethan glanced in the passenger side mirror but didn't see any pursuers.

  The highway there, unlike the Turkish side, had plenty of potholes, and the Clio hit several of them along the way, jolting Ethan. He banged his head on the low ceiling every time.

  "Can we slow down, please," Wiliam said from the backseat.

  Finally Maaz eased off the accelerator. There were still a lot of potholes, but at least the Turk had a better chance of avoiding them.

  Ten minutes later Maaz reached another checkpoint: a mangled iron fence had been strewn across the road, with a Hyundai pickup parked in the lane beside it. The vehicle was a technical—a double-barreled ZU-2 was bolted to the truck bed. The black standard of the Islamic State waved beside the anti-aircraft gun.

  Two AK-47-toting mujahadeen in balaclavas manned the checkpoint; the closest militant approached the driver side.

  M
aaz lowered the window.

  "Salaam, my brothers," the mujahid said, ignoring the driver to address Ethan. "You have come to join Dawlah?"

  Ethan leaned forward. "We have."

  The militant removed his mask. He was a teenager, maybe eighteen or nineteen years old, with a downy, cropped jihadist beard. "Welcome, my brothers. Welcome! You have made it!"

  8

  About an hour later Ethan found himself sitting beside Aaron and William in the bed of a different pickup truck, headed southeast along the dry steppe. The highway proved just as poorly maintained as the area near the border, and Ethan was jolted by a pothole every ten seconds or so.

  He had retrieved the red and white-patterned keffiyeh from his gear and was wearing it, though he was still dressed in a casual T-shirt and jeans. Twice he checked his phone for a cellular network during the ride, but never found a signal.

  The pickup stopped on the outskirts of a Syrian village. Two twenty-year-olds with AKM rifles greeted the teenaged driver. Ethan hopped down from the truck bed only to find himself the prompt recipient of a hug.

  "Salaam!" the militant who embraced him said. "I am so glad you have made your hegira! Come, I will take you to the emir. I am Abdul. What are your names?"

  "I am Emad Al'Saudi," Ethan said. Translated, that literally meant Emad the Saudi. It wasn't uncommon for foreign fighters to use an alias for their last names, especially one related to their country of origin.

  William introduced himself as Wafeeq Al'Saudi and Aaron as Aadil Al'Yemeni.

  "Most of our trainers are Saudis and Yemenis!" Abdul said excitedly. "You will fit right in."

  Ethan wasn't sure whether that was good or bad.

  Abdul threaded through the white-walled, flat-roofed houses, leading the way into the Islamic State border camp. Untilled wheat fields surrounded the concrete buildings of the former village; various structures had been erected in the withered pastures to support the training exercises. Large canvases patterned in digital desert camouflage had been raised over the more obvious constructions—when viewed from the air, those patterns would readily blend in with the dry yellow grass.