Callsign: Bishop (Erik Somers) (Chesspocalypse #5)

“Joker” was CJ’s official callsign. It probably had something to do with his group name, but Bishop didn’t know. He’d never even met the man face to face. Sometimes Black Ops were like that. He typed Y on the keyboard.

The fiber-optic connection downloaded the 2 MB file in less than a second, and it opened on a picture of a Middle Eastern couple sitting at the table. They looked to be in their late fifties or early sixties, and appeared to be sitting down to dinner. The woman’s face was clearly visible, indicating the pair were either moderate Muslims or in their own home. Judging by the setting—which seemed to be a large, private dining area—Bishop assumed the latter.

But what could these two middle aged Muslims have to do with him?

He read the caption attached to the photo.



DAWOUD AND FAIZA ABBASI, 23052011 18:27 IRST. SvPh #1138-7A



He checked the tag at the back of the caption. 23052011 was a date: April 23, 2011, and IRST stood for Iran Standard Time. SvPh stood for Surveillance Photo. That meant whoever had snapped the picture had taken it in secret at 6:27 pm in Iran over four months ago. Judging by the number attached, it was one of many such photos of the couple.

But who were they?

Bishop typed a message into the computer. What does this have to do with me? Then he hit SEND.

While he waited, he examined the couple again. They looked like any ordinary Muslim couple sitting down to eat. The man was large and broad, with a curved, hawk-like nose that gave his face an overall predatory appearance. The hair at his temples had gone to gray, but the rest of it remained jet black. His eyes were a deep brown, wrinkled at the corners in what might have been a smile if not for the stern, disapproving curve of his lips.

The woman sat to his right. Her skin was dark and her face narrow, and like her husband, her dark black hair was turning to gray. But where his face was hard and angular, hers was soft and kind, and perhaps a little sad. Her brown eyes were on the table in front of them rather than on her husband, and she held her hands folded demurely in her lap, waiting for her husband to eat first. The two were the only people in the picture. If Dawoud Abbasi had any other wives, they were not present.

Bishop sipped at his tea, willing the image to make sense. Something about the woman looked familiar, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. He zoomed the picture in, centering the image on her face. Did he know her? If so, from where? He felt like he could almost place her features, but each time he tried he just missed the connection.

When the computer beeped again, a new window popped up on the screen. Since he had already accepted a transmission from Joker, the computer assumed the sender was safe and didn’t ask for acceptance a second time, thus the message appeared right in front of his face.



THEY ARE YOUR PARENTS.



The mug of tea shattered on the floor.

***

The phone rang three times before a gruff, scratchy voice answered. “Keasling speaking. What can I do for you, Mr. President?”

“Stop calling me that,” Duncan said.

“No can do, sir. Now what’s the problem?”

“Is your line secure?”

“Of course.”

“It’s Manifold.”

“Again? Damn Ridley. He’s a real pain in the ass. Where is he now?”

“It’s not him this time,” Duncan said. “Manifold was working on what we believe to be a weaponized form of ergot poisoning. They never finished it because the team infiltrated the facility before they could.”

“Weaponized ergot?” Keasling asked. “You mean, Ridley made the stuff more dangerous?”

“What do you know about ergot?”

“It’s a nasty poison. Been around for thousands of years. Used in warfare as far back as 2400 BC. The Assyrians used to—”

“Right. That’s the stuff,” Duncan said. He should have known Keasling would know all about ergot’s military history. “Manifold was working on an additive.”

“But you said Chess Team shut them down. That sounds like good news to me. What’s the problem?”

“The problem is Manifold put one of their research labs in the middle of the Kavir Desert.”

“Iran? Why would Ridley build there?”

“Best guess? To be close to their potential clientele. Plus, if something went wrong it would be written off as an Iranian weapons lab.”

“Makes sense.”

“But something went wrong,” Duncan continued. “Two weeks before the raid on the Alpha facility, a climate-controlled storage bunker in Iran was raided by jihadists, who discovered it while chasing down a pair of local men. It didn’t take long for them to realize what they had found. I have some video footage from the bunker’s security camera showing a group of them carrying out gallons on the stuff.”

“Are you telling me that a group of Islamic radicals in Iran has a cache of weaponized ergot?”

“That’s exactly what I am telling you.”