The agency was, according to the rest of the world, not in the business of covert field operations. They were the technology geeks, the code makers and code breakers who built supercomputers and called those seventy-two-hour workweeks "good times." They were the analysts who could gain access to, and examine, every piece of information available, no matter the media--from highly encrypted satellite phone calls between heads of state to extremely low-frequency transmissions from naval vessels to the e-mails and text messages passed between average citizens. They were rarely in direct competition with the military services, although most military folks wished for a one-handed intelligence representative--not because they wanted to hire the handicapped but because pronouncements like "On the one hand they could attack, and on the other hand they could retreat," never helped in military decision making.

That these geeks would ever be involved in the covert and/or human angle of intelligence would surprise some individuals within the agency. Moreover, if Third Echelon's existence were ever made public, accidentally or otherwise, liberal- minded bureaucrats across the United States might very well clutch their chests and drop to the waxed wooden floors of their offices. Obviously, the often morally ambiguous business of protecting the nation could not be left to the faint of heart.

Enter Third Echelon's Splinter Cells.

Splinter Cell operatives aggressively collected intelligence vital to U.S. security. They protected critical U.S. information systems and kept all operations invisible to the public eye. They worked outside the boundaries of international treaties, knowing full well that if captured the United States would neither acknowledge nor support their operations. They bridged the gap between gathering intel and acting upon it, and Hansen could not be more honored or more proud to dedicate his life to something as important as protecting the country he so dearly loved. Perhaps that sounded cheesy or naive; he didn't care and assumed that in ten years he'd be just as cynical as any other government employee. But right now he believed in the ideals and in the fact that freedom was, of course, never free.

To that end, Hansen now stood deep within the subterranean confines of the NSA, in a sector that did not exist. With some trepidation, he swiped his ID badge through the reader, listened for the muted beep, and the LED turned green.

He found Grim seated alone at the diamond-shaped conference table inside the situation room. All around her, intelligence seemed to course through the room's veins, the unseen servers reverberating like a thousand heartbeats per second. Big-screen LCD status boards hung from the walls, and three-dimensional maps, streaming security-camera videos, and electronic dossiers of known terrorists flashed and scrolled and rotated like the collected imagery extracted from some colossal brain. In fact, the entire power grid was in a constant state of upgrade in order to accommodate the agency's ever-increasing demand for electricity. As Grim liked to muse, "The beast must be fed."

Hansen shuddered as he made eye contact with her. All right, she was his boss. She had hired him. But damn if he didn't feel a connection. Act on it? That would take some serious courage. Nevertheless, there was something deliciously reckless about lusting after a woman ten years his senior, especially one as strong-willed and incredibly intelligent as Anna. Hansen imagined some serious fire lurking beneath her conservative exterior. Her short, medium brown hair barely touched her shoulders, and she frequently wore shirt/jacket combinations in earth tones or pastels, along with matching skirts and those glasses that Hansen longed to see removed. Her eyes were a blue-green flecked with gold, and as she stood, he forced himself not to probe anywhere near her ample chest, unsuccessfully hidden beneath her jacket. She moved silently around the table in her flats, rubbed a sore spot on her lower back, then gestured to their left.

"So this is it, Ben. I'm sending you to Russia. This will be your first real field operation. Think you can handle it?"

A chill worked its way across Hansen's shoulders. Finally, a chance to prove himself in the field after six months of hard training. He took a deep breath, but before he could answer, Grim added, "That's a rhetorical question. I wouldn't have picked you if I didn't think you could do this."

"Yes, ma'am."

"I've never seen anyone challenge our trainers the way you have. . . . Well, maybe one other. But the point is that we've been very impressed with your skills. Who knew that a country boy from Fort Stockton would end up here?" She grinned broadly and gestured to the web of technology spanning the room.

Hansen shrugged. "I wasn't much of a cowboy."

"Lucky for us. And, you know, when I met you at the bar that night, I knew you were Splinter Cell material. And I knew you were wasting your talent at the CIA. So this moment is, in fact, unsurprising. You belong with us. And you belong out there, in the field."

He wanted to say, I belong with you, but instead said, "I'm ready, ma'am."

"All right, then." She crossed to a computer terminal, where she called up several photographs of a balding, bearded man in his late forties. He wore a dark brown parka and stood beside a snow-covered sedan, lighting up a cigarette. Hansen focused on the two most significant aspects of the man's appearance: his large hoop earring and the ponytail that writhed down his coat like a snake. Hansen also recognized the area behind the man as Lubyanka Square, in downtown Moscow, not because he'd visited but because he'd learned that Russia's old KGB had once been headquartered there.

Grim sipped her coffee. "This is Mikhail Bratus, a longtime agent with the GRU."

The GRU (Glavnoje Razvedyvatel'noje Upravlenije) is the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Russian Armed Forces' General Staff. It gathers human intelligence through military attaches and agents and relies upon a vast network of SIGINT (signals intelligence) satellites.

A recent defector from the GRU warned that all of the United States had been penetrated by agents who had orchestrated the delivery of secret arms caches--including suitcase nukes--that were hidden and waiting for Russian special forces poised to invade the country. Government leaders in every state were being watched and targeted by assassination squads that were ready to strike once war got under way.

It was quite a story, and not a word of it had ever been verified, but Hansen was fascinated by the account and had read the interviews several times.

"Bratus is a very clever and well-respected agent. He has dangerous ties to several drug cartels, both in the Russian Federation and Afghanistan. He employs many of the drug runners to serve as his eyes and ears while they move their drugs on the trains and highways out of Vladivostok."

As Grim spoke, Hansen had a hard time concentrating. Her perfume was intoxicating.

"Ben? Are you listening? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"I'm sorry, I was just, uh, thinking about Bratus. Is there information I need to get from him?"

Grim took a deep breath, then removed her glasses and rubbed the corners of her eyes. "I wish it were that easy." She called up another photograph. A lean Chinese man with gray hair at his temples was getting out of an economy car. Other than the hair, he was quite nondescript, one Chinese man among 1.4 billion. Typical. Forgettable. And that was exactly how they wanted him.

"This is Yuan Zhao. We've identified him as a field agent with the Guoanbu. Works out of their technology bureau."