Nano Ops II: The Year Of The Rat

By William F. Seeds

In this heart-pounding follow-up to Nano Ops: Go Dark, the high-school foursome led by Skylar, a competitive drone racer, are back to slow the launch of a nuclear threat against the United States.

• Language: English
• Publisher: William F. Seeds
• Release date: Sep 4, 2023
• ISBN: 9798822923881

William F. Seeds

William F. Seeds began his journey as a storyteller in his mid-forties, proving that passion knows no timeline. From guiding novices in Get into Investing to exploring the sinister in Tattoo Voodoo, William has showcased a vast narrative range. Nano Ops, his latest saga, delves into the adventurous world of drone pilots and high-tech espionage. When he's not penning gripping tales, William is sharing updates on his personal website and gearing up for his next thrilling venture.

Book preview

The clicking of his wooden sole shoes echoed through the hallway, just after passing the marines guarding the east entrance to the Pentagon. Situation room F was at the opposite end of the large facility, where there wasn’t any parking.

The hall of the wing was quiet, aside from a single-person patrol with a dog. As the patrol approached, the colonel knew to reach out his identification so the marine corporal could see it easier. The corporal didn’t even acknowledge the colonel seeing he had the proper credentials, lifting his right hand to salute.

Colonel Martinez made his way up the empty hall. He wasn’t sure what his boss needed to see him about. He had spent years video calling his boss for a weekly ass-chewing. The successes in drone technology that the colonel has gathered up over the last couple years has really paid off for the CIA and other decision makers that rely on its cunning technology. The last time the colonel spoke with his boss, General Greg Mathers, he seemed happy about the team stopping the destruction in Seattle. There was nothing but praise, but then again that was quite a few months ago. The colonel doesn’t put much emotion into the unknown, just continues up the hall to the furthest situation room from parking in the building. He starts wondering if his boss did this on purpose.

There was a single sergeant in front of the situation room that requested to see the colonel’s credentials closer. He placed the badge against the reader to allow the colonel to enter the secured area, before returning it to him. This was one of the rare situation rooms that had an area around it. It was a room, within a room. The outer room was vacuumed sealed and the interior room was big enough for a large conference room. It was also known as one of the most secure in the building; not allowing eavesdropping from neighboring walls. Today, the Collaborative Intelligence Committee Board meeting was gathering and it was no doubt they wanted the colonel’s latest updates directly. The colonel walks slowly through the short hallway between the two rooms that housed multiple different types of scanners. The door at the opposite side slides open, relieving pressure between the two volumes of space. He walks through the secured entry and it quickly closes behind him. There were six seats, with only four filled. One contained his boss, General Greg Mathers, whom he hasn’t seen in person for a while.

Good morning, colonel. The general says as he enters. He sees the colonel is still a little weary from the travel to the east coast.

G’morning, sir. The colonel replies slowly. Looking at the other high-ranking brass in the room.

I want you to meet CIA Co-Director Casey Worthington. The general held his hand to the man on his left. On this side, we have General George Matternay and General Moses Tanner. Missing, we have the Secretary of Defense, Jonathan Covington and Admiral Alex Jones. He continues introducing the absent members with a hand gesture as they were seated at the other end of the table.

Good morning sirs. It is good to meet you all. The colonel replies, starting to get the idea that this isn’t going to be a good meeting. He was already skeptical about the reason that his boss asked him to travel across the US, just for a meeting. It seems to be a waste of resources to make him travel just for a conversation.

Colonel Martinez, we wanted to ask you a few questions. General Matternay asks.

Of course, general. The colonel quickly responds.

I have to be blunt here. Are you relying on underage kids to execute missions for the CIA? General Matternay asks. He is aware they have plenty of time to discuss the issues of national security, but that seems to be the biggest topic on his mind at the moment.

Yes. The colonel responds quietly. Before he could add additional rebuttal to the question, his boss defended him.

General, those kids had skills equaling decades of training in our simulations. General Mathers says quickly. Within a few minutes of meeting the child operatives, he knew they were capable of using the tech swiftly and didn’t need much training. They were running operations within a couple first flights, just like it was natural to them. None of the initial pilot testing he saw the colonel and the pair of doctors perform showed any hope the project would ever be utilized for its purpose. Its major flaw was the performance of the pilots and everyone in the room was aware of that fact.

I understand that General Mathers, however it is still a question of national security. Matternay snaps back.

We did a quick background check before we engaged them for performing missions and didn’t let them know any mission details. They never knew the bigger picture of what they were doing. The colonel suggests in his defense. Gathering tech and smart people to run the projects never seemed to have rules in the past. He ponders the private sector every now and then, but it is almost time to retire. Just have to keep this upper brass happy for a couple more years.

I don’t think that is enough. General Tanner says from his side of the curved table. Each of the members of the room look in his direction. We saw that you had a few security breaches while they were still learning and as they gained experience in the field that really tightened up. He continues.

The colonel isn’t going to say anything else unless asked another question. There are too many high ranking people in this room, along with his boss, to try overpowering and leading the conversation. He’s only here to answer questions. The four are shuffling papers around, seemingly looking for questions that aren’t on the papers in front of them.

General Matternay looks up to the colonel. Colonel, your last year has been very well appreciated, but we have to inform you that there’s been a leak. He suggests, knowing the colonel runs a really tight ship and has never had a security breach in the decades that he’s managed projects for the Collaborative Intelligence Committee.

Impossible. The colonel replies quickly.

General Mathers knows that he has some responsibility if the colonel is hung out to dry, so he quickly responds to the accusation, We don’t know if it’s one of his people, George. It was a hint.

The Co-Director for the CIA could care less about the battle of ranks within the military, he’s only concerned about the nature of the leak and the possible people that it could be. Casey Worthington was the one that had to brief the President on possible threats to national security every morning. Every day he felt it was making him older, showing gray hair in his early forties. It has been six months since his boss fell ill and took a leave of absence. The CIA Director, Jason Schmit was a much easier person to deal with and mostly didn’t rock the boat when it came to the military guys arguing. He’d just let them yell it out and read email from his laptop. Hopefully Casey will get a chance to take his spot if he ends up leaving the organization for a lesser stressful position. Co-Director Worthington had another follow up question; Colonel, who else knows about this tech?

The colonel had to recollect all the missions and projects over the last two years, since the specialized drone technology was initially introduced. It was just after the pulse engine tech for the Raven was discovered after blasting through two buildings in a contractor’s lab. I could count them on one hand sir, is all he replies with.

Well I can tell you that there has been a discovery by our operatives working in Russia. They found some info on a secure server while hacking a known Russian tech company. Worthington suggests. They found the initial diagrams from the 3D printing technology we used in Seattle. He continues.

Not to defend the conversation, but we never made any diagrams of the tech. They were all computer renders that never made it to a piece of paper. The defending General Mathers says, almost interrupting the Co-Director. The colonel nods in agreement.

The Co-Director isn’t satisfied with words. He slides an image that was captured by the covert operatives, detailing the 3D printed fly’s capabilities. Although the colonel can’t see the picture, he can see the look on his boss’s face. It was of sheer fear that the technology has made it into the wrong hands and the secret is out. He slides it to the colonel at the other side of the conference table. The full-page image showed all the details of the drone insect; sensors and mechanical devices, along with its battery location and specifications for power printed on the back of the single page. It was clear enough to build one; detailed size and composition of the 3D materials used to print it. The drawing had a parts list showing only a few components, with visual and auditory sensors highlighted.

Colonel Martinez and General Mathers were speechless looking at the evidence presented. The colonel was perplexed by the escape of info and especially at this detail. He reviews the drawing to recollect anyone that may have passed information around in the early stages of development. He was solely responsible for the multiple projects and only he and the two doctors knew about these projects’ final usage. The CIA ended up providing a lot of the technical support for the initial designs before it was mass-printable. Even in the early stages, before a fly was ever printed, its design was all done on the computer. The colonel thought he had some level of relief that this wasn’t caused by him, with the intelligence community assisting in the early development. After the CIA finalized the 3D designs, they were in the dark how it was used. Dr.’s Falkner and Bennington were the only ones that knew what the final products did and orchestrated the whole building of the delivery vehicles; rat and raven. Each of them built over twenty of those ravens and a dozen rats before the funding for the project was cut a few months ago. Almost all the support people for the colonel’s project were let go, they closed all the support locations outside of the US and appeared to have abandoned the project after the Seattle incursion. This would be a good reason to sell-out to anyone that wanted to pay a fee to have the information.

Since the drawing doesn’t have any date information, it’s hard to know when it was copied or produced. Colonel Martinez says, hoping to add any other angle they haven’t thought about.

What about any of your support people, Colonel? Do you think they are still loyal? Co-Director Worthington asks.

Yes sir. Even the ones that were let go. The colonel replies. We still run audits to assure that as well. He continues. The audits that the colonel performed seemed pretty strong for many years. Sometimes he’d run into them in public, where he’d know they would be. In most cases, he would just pick up the phone and chat with them for a few minutes; catching up with their recent events and listening to them talk about what is going on in their lives at the moment. He would take detailed notes and research them after the call to see if there was any deception in their discussion. Over his time in the military, he’s grown to admire and learn from many of his prior work associates and subordinates, creating lifelong friendships with thousands of people.

Can we monitor the Russian tech company a little longer and see if that’s all they know about? General Mathers adds to the discussion.

That’s what we intend to do, General. Co-Director Worthington responds.

The group didn’t have any further questions and let the colonel return to his home in Seattle, Washington. With most of his project support personnel gone now, he has to close the manufacturing areas for the drones and box up all the interior by himself. He can’t take any more risks in anyone seeing anything in that building. Moth-balling one of his best projects didn’t really seem important when he got home and he just sat at his desk in that building looking at all the papers that had been thrown on his desk. Before the colonel left for D.C., he had to inform Dr. Bennington that his services were no