Chapter 18
I pondered what I should do, as I ran my morning three miles. While running might be good for your heart and circulatory system, it doesn't really take a lot of concentration. That left me with a lot of time for thinking.
For the last couple of years, I had watched the US taking a large and active roll in world events, mostly concerning the Middle East. I shook my head over the terrorist situation. It was now 2005, and I was trying to decide if I should take a more active roll in intelligence gathering for the US.
I was doing pretty well with my business of finding and restoring cars, having gotten it down to a fine art. I did cheat a bit, sometimes. Why not use my abilities to bring back these beauties, for those who would appreciate them? I did take care not to get too well known. I also made sure I had a clear paper trail, courtesy of my computer.
As I ran, I noticed something that was a little out of place. Did I mention before that I was out in the middle of nowhere? My closest neighbor was a goodly distance from my house. I was also set back from the road far enough to give me even more privacy.
So what was a gas truck doing out here? The place they were set up at, had no gas lines at all. The reason I knew this, was because the distance from my home to the actual main gas line, had been expensive. This gas truck was not following the trunk line to my place, at all.
Come to think of it, there had been a lot of utility trucks parked out in this area, lately. Mostly electric, and now here was a gas truck where there was no gas line. On the other hand, how many people knew the actual route their line ran? I did because I had been curious about why mine had cost so much.
My paranoia kicked into high gear, but I continued my jog with no pause or interruption. If I was being watched, there was no need to change my routine. That would make me stand out, more than continuing on as normal would. I did note the license plate number of the truck as I ran by, though.
Had I tipped my hand, somehow? Was I being watched by the government? There was an old saying: "Just because your paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get you!" A healthily paranoid attitude was mandatory in my life.
After I got back from my run I confronted my computer.
"I think I am being watched, and I think it is by a governmental agency," I told it.
"Checking for surveillance by local police... negative. Checking with State police... negative. Checking with FBI... negative. Checking with CIA... Negative. Checking with Homeland security... negative. Checking with NSA... negative. Checking with military intelligence branches... working... negative.
"There is no active surveillance ordered by any of the active agencies of the US government. Going to foreign governments. This will take a while longer... working, working... working. Negative on any intelligence branch, nor are you being looked at by any terrorist organization, which is computerized at this time,"
"Well, call me paranoid, but we have had the phone company, the electric company, and now the gas company out here in the past couple weeks, and the gas company truck is at a location that has no lines whatsoever, but it is in a good position to monitor this house, visually," I told it a bit grumpily.
"I am unable to check with private sources such as offline private investigation companies, or other companies that do not keep standard operations such as governments do, unless they are on line. I can check those I am able too, if you wish. Also, if you give me the license plates numbers, I might be able to track down registration on the vehicles in question," the computer responded.
That made sense, and I gave him the plate number for the gas company truck. It was not the biggest utility in the area, and the truck was in fact registered to a gas company. But, when we queried the company acting as a police computer, the company in question stated that a private detective agency had requested a vehicle from them. An exorbitant amount of rent had been paid for the vehicle, for the next three days.
That answered my question. Total elapsed time to find this out was a little over twenty minutes. Now who would be curious enough to go to these lengths, to rent vehicles from utility companies, or private companies?
I set the computer to back tracking, and it said this could take hours, days, or even weeks. Not a good sign.
I decided it was time for a trip into the past. I thought about the distance in time I could now go. If I so desired, I could go to ancient times. The problem was, I did not have the power to jump back, unless I was in a city. Most likely, I would need to make the return back in a series of jumps. The furthest back I had been was a visit to Rome, around 135 A.D.
I had also practiced putting a large amounts of weight into the 'between' and transporting it. So far, I was up to twenty-five tons at one lift. I could then transport it back one thousand years. Which meant I could transport that much weight to the future in return! I had been thinking gold and such, but there were other items I could transfer as well.
For example, I now had an entire Soviet missile launcher and some fairly sophisticated intermediate range missiles stored in the 'between'. By intermediate, I meant something in the 700 to 1200 mile range. I had twenty of these missiles. The world's intelligence community assumed they had been sold by the Russian General in charge, but I was actually the thief.
There was nothing nuclear. Each had high explosive warheads, except for four. Four were fitted with a fast acting nerve agent, which dissipated fairly quickly. I felt the need for some fire power, although I didn't know what I would use them for, as of yet. The strangest part, was that it had been my computer that had suggested I gather a bit of an arsenal.
I also had some French made anti-ship missiles, with launchers. I also had a number of Stinger missiles, which I had 'liberated' from the fighters in Afghanistan who were fighting the Soviet Union. It had been a short 'time dive' to the 80's to retrieve them. As far as the US government was concerned, these were either expended or in storage by the now defunct Taliban government.
I finally decided on teleporting to Europe, but first, I would need a passport to get to a few of the places I wanted to go. That turned out to be no trouble for my computer. It had an attachment that turned out documents from a simple fishing permit, to almost any type of document from any government in the world.
My computer issued me an international driver's license, which was good for a whole host of countries. My future self had really set this computer up with some very sophisticated capabilities.
I then asked the computer if it would give me a rundown on a future terroist activity. I might be able to give the US or British governments intelligence that they could act on.
One result, was that after I started doing this, my computer actually told me it now had two separate files on a particular incident. It had one that had happened previously, where I had not interfered, and then the one that I did. The hairs stood up on the back of my neck as I realized I was messing with time and history.
Still, I was fairly safe in my actions. I would teleport to a location that was going to be hit by terrorist activity, 'time dive' and then observe the terrorists planting the devices while I was in the 'almost there.' I then went a bit further back in time, and reported the activity to one of the appropriate agencies, which then took action.
I started doing this in the recent past, and worked up to my present. I now had a nice new code name, "Dodger", which I used with several agencies around the world. They had found that information from "Dodger" was accurate. When he gave it, it was given in a timely manner, to head off an incident, which would surely have resulted in the loss of life and damage to property. He was also responsible for the capture of several wanted "suspects", who were known to have been involved in long time activities that most governments around the world frowned on. IE murder, planting bombs, etc.
While I didn't just report to the US or British governments exclusively, they were my first pick as they were the most active, in my opinion, in fighting and prosecuting terrorists.
I had found that the Turkish government would act on information only as it pertained to itself, and was reluctant to share any information I gave it with other countries or agencies. I dropped the agency I was using in Turkey a line, saying if they continued in this manner, I would stop providing them information that would be vital to the safety of their citizens.
Turkey was not the only country that practiced this behavior though. One reason I got away with my "Dodger" identity so easily and for so long, was because the US thought I was a British agent, and the Brits thought I belonged to the US, or another friendly power and so forth. Still, several agencies were actively seeking "Dodger" to 'speak' with him or her, and discover where his or her loyalties lay. It was sometimes annoying and always a bit amusing.
They really wanted to put an identity and country and control on this freelance agent. "Dodger" had a tendency to show up governmental agencies on a regular basis, with his or her information. This seemed to annoy them greatly.
I also found it beneficial to open a relationship with the world press. It was a two way service, actually. When I decided a government should be called to the carpet by its people for gross stupidity, I would inform the press of that nation (as well as a few other organizations) of the willful disregard of information, that could have prevented specific actions by a terrorist hit.
I did this as a last resort. It was not my intent to discredit the government in question, just slap it with the obvious to get its attention. What better way than letting the public know its government was dragging its feet like a stubborn child does when it can't get its way? The media ate that shit up! They particularly loved giving the US government black eyes. This came to the point where I became annoyed with them over it.
Unless I was mistaken, it was the job of the media to report the news or events as they happened, not slant them in a specific way. Personal viewpoints and politics entered that arena frequently. This caused me to do a little digging into the media personnel, and exposing some of their peccadilloes!
Amazingly, they did not enjoy it much when they were raked over the coals for getting caught deliberately slanting a story against a government, for no other reason than politics.
In five short years, I had become a "known" person to the intelligence community as well as to the media. Courtney was ever by my side, smacking me down if I so much as thought to deviate from a plan we started. She was as much a part of "Dodger", as I was. I was the legs and body, and she was part of the brain of the "Dodger" persona. It was a team effort by myself, Courtney and the computer.
I had a good laugh when the computer said that a new report had been made on our "Dodger" persona by the CIA. Apparently it was now considered that the agent "Dodger", was most likely a disaffected intelligence agent, from either the US or British government. It was speculated that rogue elements within either of these two governments were providing protection for said "Dodger."
It went further, stating that the CIA doubted a government other than the US or the British could have produced an agent of the caliber of "Dodger". This was followed by a likely forensic psychiatric model of the motivations of said "Dodger."
They got everything wrong, mostly. The only thing the report got right was when it was theorized that at some point in his/her career, agent Dodger must have felt let down by his/her supervisor or government.
Well, it was true, I was disappointed with some of the actions of my government. But that can be true of roughly fifty percent of the population, at all times. If you were a republican, and a democratic president had been elected, you were most likely disappointed. The same was true in reverse for democrats. So at any given time, a government could count on about half of the country being disappointed. I laughed my ass off when I got this report.
Another thing I did, was install and reprogram all the missiles I now had at my beck and call. This even included the stinger missiles. I also made portable computer controlled launchers for them. All the launchers for the other missiles were now controlled by my computer. It had strict instruction on when and why to fire a missile, without my telling it to fire.
I was very interested in the new upgrades I did on the stingers. A little chip gave it the ability to identify its target, and lock on to the engines or fuel tanks, and ignore defensive capabilities. This was going to really piss off whomever I shot my stingers at. The same with my intermediate missiles. They could not be fooled now, by ECM, chaff, or flares.
Yes, a lot of people were definitely going to be pissed about the upgrades I gave these 'little items'.
Edited by TeNderLoin