I plugged the flash drive into the USB port on my phone and immediately got a bunch of read-error messages. The thing had been in someone’s stomach, so that was no surprise. However, I went through the steps to do a forced upload of bulk data and soon images were whipping across the screen too fast for me to see. Damaged or not, there was a lot of stuff on the drive. The upload failed twice and I had to repeat the steps, but eventually I got the UPLOAD COMPLETE message.

I scrolled back through the contents at a slower speed until I found a series of JPEGs, one of which was the picture Rasouli had showed me. It looked so innocent, so nondescript in its metal case. And though I know that machines have no personality, I could not help but ascribe the word “evil” to it, as if the malign intent of its creators had been somehow transferred to the device during its construction.

I took a breath, engaged the code scrambler, and punched a speed dial. The phone rang three times.

“Go,” was all Church said, which is more than he usually gives when he answers a phone.

“Boss, I have a Firehall One situation.”

“Is there a finger on a trigger?” His voice sounded as calm as if I asked him who pitched for the Orioles last night.

“Unknown. But … from the vibe I got from my source I’d say this is something coming at us rather than already here.”

“Tell me.”

“I just uploaded the contents of a flash drive to the server. It’s damaged goods. It’s filed under my name and coded for you, eyes only.”

I could hear him tapping keys on his laptop as I spoke.

“Okay, I have the data. Where did this originate? Who’s your source?”

“You’re going to love this,” I said, and told him everything. He did not interrupt once, and I hoped that he was alone because this was going to really test his Vulcan calm.

After a short pause, Church asked, “Were you able to verify his connection to Vox? Could Rasouli have simply thrown the name at you to win your trust?”

“I don’t think so. Vox told him to tell me that he vetted Grace and she was clean. He said ‘She wasn’t one of mine.’”

There was a longer pause. “Interesting.”

“Isn’t it, though?”

“Rasouli made no move to arrest you?”

“Just the opposite,” I said. “Rasouli teased me by saying that one of the devices might be in the U.S. He couldn’t have been more vague if he’d spoken in code, though.”

“You don’t believe him?”

“I’m not sure I’d believe him if he said the desert was made out of sand. But…”

“Where are you?”

“My hotel room.”